siness Opening: 




for Girls 



S ALL IE JOY WHITE 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

—t-o*& 

Shelf.i.VS[58 



UNITED STATES OP AMERICA. 




THE SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS GIRL 



BUSINESS OPENINGS 
FOR GIRLS 



7>tya SALLIE JOY WHITE 

Author of " Cookery in the Public Schools ' 



;j|^ yv 



BOSTON 

D LOTHROP COMPANY 

WASHINGTON STREET OPPOSITE BROMFIELD 






Gf3 1 I 

1* 






CorYRIGHT, 1S9I, 
BY 

D. Lothrop Com v any. 



TO 

MY DEAR LITTLE DAUGHTERS 

BESSIE AND GRACE 

WHO HAVE BEEN SUCH AN INSPIRATION IN MY 

WORK FOR OTHER GIRLS, THIS LITTLE 

VOLUME IS DEDICATED BY THEIR 

LOVING MOTHER. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS , . ' 9 

CHAPTER II. 

SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS (C0?ltinued) 2$ 

CHAPTER III. 

ARTISTIC AND HYGIENIC DRESSMAKING . 36 

CHAPTER IV. 

NEWSPAPER WORKERS .... 48 

CHAPTER V. 

newspaper workers (continued) . . 59 

CHAPTER VI. 

stenographers and type-writers . 70 



CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER VII. 

PRESERVES AND PICKLES . 83 

CHAPTER VIII. 

GUIDES AND SHOPPERS .... 93 

CHAPTER IX. 

PROFESSIONAL MENDERS . . . 105 

CHAPTER X. 

REAL ESTATE BROKERAGE . . . 117 

CHAPTER XI. 

INSURANCE AND ADVERTISING . . 130 

CHAPTER XII. 

PIANO AND ORGAN TUNING . . . 1 42 



BUSINESS OPENINGS FOR GIRLS 



CHAPTER I. 

SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 

WOMEN who were girls half a century 
ago, and who, looking back over the 
years, see what the time has brought both in 
the way of advantage and opportunity, may 
well call this, as one of them did to me not 
long since, "The golden age for women." 

My own dear mother had a natural love for 
the practice of medicine and surgery. She 
never thought of such a thing as studying and 
practicing them, but how earnestly she wished 
she had been a boy so that she might have had 
her beloved profession. Yet she never dared 

9 



IO SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 

to breathe that wish aloud, for it would have 
been considered " unlady-like," and she would 
have been regarded as little less than a lunatic 
had she spoken the wish of her heart into the 
most sympathetic ear. So, as she did not care 
to attract undue attention, she kept quiet. And 
when the time at last came that a woman did 
study medicine, and take the degree of M. D., 
and had the liberty to hang out a sign announc- 
ing her occupation, my mother had taken upon 
herself duties which she could not lay aside for 
a student's life. But no one was more glad 
than she when this did come about. Other 
women could have what she was denied, and 
that made a happiness for her. 

" When I was a girl," our noble Lucy 
Stone once said to me, " I seemed to be 
shut out of everything that I wanted to do. I 
might teach school, that is if I would keep as 
good order and teach as well as a man for a 
good deal less money ; I might go out dress- 
making, or tailoring, or trim bonnets, or I might 



SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. II 

work in a factory, or go out to domestic service. 
Thus the 'mights' ended and the 'might nots' 
began. A few years ago, when my daughter 
left Boston University, with her degree of B. A., 
she might do what she chose. All the professions 
were open to her, she could enter into any line 
of business." 

Mrs. Stone did not say, although she might 
have done so with absolute truth, that it was 
because she, and others like her, had been per- 
sistent and courageous and true, that the way 
had been made possible, not only for her own 
daughter, but for thousands of other daughters. 
Bless her for the brave work she has done ! 

To-day the young woman pauses to consider 
which of the many open roads she shall take. 
It has ceased to be a matter of obligation to 
her, it is largely a question of choice. 

These chapters will not touch upon the profes- 
sions which are open to women ; they are for 
the girls who have no special desire to study 
medicine or law or theology ; they are for the 



12 SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 

every-day, wide awake, alert girls who have busi- 
ness capacity, and prefer an active life to the 
sedentary one of the student. Neither will they 
touch upon any of the phases of artistic life. 
They are to be as practical as possible, and I 
want to say here that they are none of them 
theoretical. They will not tell merely what 
girls may do, but what they have done. 

One of the first openings that came to women, 
outside of the circumscribed list that was given 
by Mrs. Stone, was that of tending in stores. 
This opening was made at the time of the Civil 
War, when so many men went into the army, 
leaving occupations of every kind, that women 
must needs do the work. Those of you who 
have made a study of history understand that 
when an advance step is made it is never re- 
traced. There is no such thing as going back. 
So when in the story of the world's progress, 
you read of the advancement made by women, 
you take the fact gladly, because it is something 
done for all time. The women who have lived 



SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 13 

and worked any part of the time for the past 
twenty-five years, have felt that they were living 
and working in one of the most important epoch's 
of the civilized world's history. A young girl 
came to me the other day, alive and alert, as 
the girl of to-day is, and said, " I am so glad 
that it has been given me to live just now. I 
come to all the good things of life as a heritage, 
and yet not so late but that I catch the echoes 
of the struggle for its possession, and kiss the 
hands of the women who have gained it for 
me." That was just after she had witnessed 
the closing tableau of the Historical Pageant, 
which showed the women of achievement, in 
art, profession, or trade, who stood, nearly a 
hundred of them, grouped about Mrs. Julia 
Ward Howe, Mrs. Mary Livermore and Mrs. 
Lucy Stone. I don't wonder that this girl, full 
of ideals of true living, thrilled, as she said, " to 
her finger-tips," when the group sang " The Bat- 
tle Hymn of the Republic," and the immense 
audience rose to its feet to do homage to the 



14 SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 

author, who was the central figure of the whole. 
Being a girl of average ability, and firm prin- 
ciple, it is a good time in which to live. The 
chances for success are good, and opportunity 
is better than it ever has been. 

Take mercantile life, for instance. I have 
often heard young girls say that it was all 
nonsense to expect any preferment there ; that 
only the men got advanced, and that only men 
became the head of the house. Now there is 
no reason why a woman should not conduct a 
mercantile business if she wishes, and if she has 
the capital. Presumably one reason that women 
do not is because when they have money they 
prefer to invest it in some manner which shall 
bring them a steady income, without exertion 
of their own. They let the money do the earn- 
ing, and they take the result. Another reason 
is, that when girls take a position, they do not, 
as boys do. take it with the idea of making it a 
life work. It is with them a temporary matter, 
a something to bridge over a time of waiting 



SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 1 5 

between leaving school and settling down into 
homes of their own. With a boy it is serious 
business ; with a girl it is a make-shift. 

But when a girl really makes up her mind to 
succeed, she usually does what she sets out to. 
There is in the city of Boston a woman, not 
yet in middle life, who is the proprietor and 
manager of four large and fashionable millinery 
establishments. About the year 1879, she began 
business in quite a small way at the South 
End. She attracted customers and kept them ; 
her business increased until she ventured to 
take another store farther down, still keeping 
the original one for those women who had got 
into the habit of going there. Still the business 
grew ; a third store, in one of the " millinery 
streets " down town, was taken, and finally a 
large establishment on Washington street was 
opened. Then she added fashionable dress- 
making to her business, employing the most 
famous " ladies' tailor " whom she could find. 
In person she manages the detail of the busi- 



l6 SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 

ness at all four of her stores, and she spends 
a part of each day in every one of them. She 
has no fixed hours ; her employes do not know 
at what time she is coming, so they are always 
ready for her. She does all her own buying, 
and there is not one loose end in all this com- 
munity of business of which she is the real head. 
Now that woman had no exceptional opportuni- 
ties ; she simply went to work in earnest, and 
"minded her business " literally. The result is 
a splendid name, a fine business, and a fortune. 
The story is not by any means a solitary instance ; 
there are others like it, but I have cited her as 
an example because I have watched her upward 
progress, and have known her struggles ever 
since she had her one shop at the South End. 

The success of any one in any line of work 
depends upon the spirit in which she takes it 
up. The following story which came under my 
notice recently, and which is true, will illustrate 
my meaning better than any explanation. A 
young girl had tried for a long time to get a 



SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 17 

position in one of the leading dry goods stores 
in Boston. Finally her persistency was re- 
warded by the promise of a trial. She was 
put at the handkerchief counter during a "bar- 
gain-sale." The first morning she was there 
a gentleman came by, and stopped at the hand- 
kerchief counter, looking carelessly at the goods 
and the prices which were marked on each box. 
She did not wait for him to ask for anything 
special, but she immediately drew his attention 
to some handkerchiefs which were really a fine 
11 bargain." He did not seem inclined to buy, 
but she was so interested to make the sale, and 
talked so intelligently about them, that the cus- 
tomer took half a dozen of the handkerchiefs. 
When Saturday night came and she was paid her 
salary, she received a sum much in advance of 
that which had been promised her. She took 
it at once to the head of her department, think- 
ing there must be a mistake, but she was assured 
that it was all right. 

" Do you remember selling a half dozen hand- 



1 8 SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 

kerchiefs to one gentleman, the first morning 
you were here ? " he inquired. 

"Why, yes, I remember," she replied, "but 
what has that to do with it ? " 

11 Simply this — that was the head of the firm ; 
and he was so pleased that he inquired about 
you, and said that any girl who could sell his 
own goods to a proprietor was worth a good 
salary and a steady place, so he ordered you 
put in the pay roll at the wages I have just 
given you, with the promise of a rise as soon as 
it is possible." 

A thing like this isn't likely to happen every 
day perhaps ; but of one thing you may rest 
quite assured, my dear girls, simple eye-service 
is noted more frequently than you imagine, 
while the honest, hearty rendering of duty will 
find the reward. Not long ago a prominent 
business man in Boston said to me, when we 
were talking over the reason why so few young 
men really succeed, some things that will bear 
repetition for the girls who think seriously of a 



SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 19 

business life. "The boys" — and he might 
have said the girls too — " in the store whose 
watches are always on time at the dinner or 
closing hour are the ones who will not advance 
in business ; while those who are asking for 
more to do, instead of making apologies for 
work not finished, are those who find room at 
the top of the ladder, and who do not complain 
of the crowd at the foot." It is the Bible's own 
"in season and out of season " work that brings 
good results. 

Perhaps another reason why women do not 
oftener attain a high position in mercantile life 
is because they do not "learn the business" as 
a boy does. When a girl seeks a position in a 
store she expects a living salary at once. The 
immediate need of money is the force which 
impels her to work; she must be her own bread- 
winner. A boy expects to give a certain time 
to learning the detail of business, and takes a 
place at first with very small remuneration, and 
works his way to the more profitable position. 



20 SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 

A gentleman in Boston, the head of one of 
the large firms, who has thought a good deal 
about this matter, determined to try this train- 
ing process with girls. So he advertised for 
one hundred girls to begin a practical mercan- 
tile training. The girls were to be graduates 
of the public schools of the city or near suburbs ; 
they were to live at home, or with friends or 
relatives who would look after them when they 
were out of the store. None would be received 
without the written consent of the parents or 
guardians. They were to be paid two dollars a 
week for a year, and at the end of that time 
were to be advanced as they deserved. 

It was a very easy matter to find the one hun- 
dred girls ; indeed double the number might 
have been readily engaged, so numerous were 
the applicants. The duties of the girls at first 
were to tend the tubes which carried the money 
to the counting-room, and do up the parcels ; 
they were changed about frequently from counter 
to counter, so when the year was over every 



SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 2 1 

bright girl knew the stock thoroughly and the 
prices, and had found out whether she liked the 
business, and what department she preferred. 
At the end of the year, the head of the firm 
requested every girl to write him a letter, telling 
him how she liked the business, and expressing 
preference as to the part she desired to serve 
in. I had the pleasure of reading all these 
letters, and I was delighted at the intelligence 
and the character that the majority of them 
showed. As far as possible the girls were pro- 
moted in the line of their expressed preference, 
and a new lot, double the number, came in to 
fill the places at the tubes. One of the girls 
who came in as a tube girl is now the superin- 
tendent of the desk of one department, and has 
a salary of eighteen dollars a week ; another is 
the head saleswoman at a counter, receiving 
fifteen dollars a week. Others receive from 
seven to twelve dollars, the average being ten 
dollars a week. The quicker they are, the 
more personal patronage they control, the more 



22 SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 

pay they have, because their services are of 
value. Mr. Jordan, for it is the senior partner 
of Jordan, Marsh & Co. who made the experi- 
ment, says he has never regretted it, for he 
feels that the girls do better work for the train- 
ing they get. One of the best proofs of the 
efficacy of his plan is the fact that every other 
house is glad to get a girl who has graduated 
from the tubes at Jordan's. 

So you see there are chances for girls, if they 
will only take them, as well as for boys ; but 
they must be in earnest, must work as though 
it were a life work, even though they do lay it 
down after a while; must not despise the day 
of small things, and must not turn the sympathy 
of the public whom they serve to ridicule and 
contempt, by speaking of themselves, as "sales- 
ladies," but honestly, simply and correctly as 
" saleswomen," until such time as they shall 
become the proprietors, wholly or in part, of an 
establishment, when they will be "merchants." 



CHAPTER II. 

SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS (continued}. 

WHEN one considers the large army of 
women and girls who are employed in 
stores all over the country, the first wonder is 
that so many can be found to fill the places. 
In several of the large stores in Boston — the 
largest ones, of course — the number of girls 
employed reaches far into the hundreds. At 
one establishment of note, which has a national 
reputation, about twelve hundred are on the pay 
roll. Of these about two hundred are cash girls, 
four hundred are tube girls, one hundred are 
stock girls, and the rest are saleswomen. At 
another large store the number is one thousand. 
Of these three hundred and ten are cash girls 
— there are no tube girls — two hundred are 
23 



24 SALESWOMEN AND CASH CIRLS. 

stock girls, and the rest salesgirls. Other es- 
tablishments, according to their capacity, employ 
from one thousand to twenty-five. 

I tried very hard, for my own satisfaction, to 
find out just about how many girls was thus 
employed in the city of Boston alone, but it 
would take a year, or even longer, by the most 
systematic method, to ascertain ; for not only do 
the large stores employ them, but every little 
thread-and-needle store has one or two girls 
employed, and usually in these the proprietor 
is also a woman. The number goes a long way 
into the thousands. And yet there is never a 
difficulty in filling a position. Does a worker 
drop out of the ranks, for any reason whatever, 
somebody is always waiting to step into her 
place, and oftener than not there are a dozen 
disappointed ones for the one successful seeker. 
There is a pathetic side to this, which must be 
recognized. In spite of the number of women 
and girls employed, there is an ever-increasing 
number waiting for the chance. The supply 



SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 25 

every year grows still greater than the demand 
— a condition of affairs which economists always 
consider unfortunate. 

And just here, before stating the duties which 
devolve upon these girls and women who enter 
the mercantile life, I want to say a word to the 
young women outside the large cities who think 
that the fortune for which they so ardently long 
may be reached at a grasp within the boun- 
daries of town. There can be no fallacy more 
fatal than this. It is like believing fairy tales, 
or taking the Arabian Nights seriously. 

The city is no place to come to expecting to 
find employment, unless one has friends who 
can use influence in her behalf and befriend 
her when she comes, friendless and strange, 
into the midst of a new life. Workers are plenty 
in the cities. One has only to go into the office 
of some merchant who has advertised for extra 
help, say at the holiday season. As a rule, if 
fifty are wanted, five hundred will come to apply. 
The majority of these have to be disappointed 



26 SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 

of course. All these applicants are from the 
city or near suburbs ; and with all this army 
to choose from, what chance does the girl stand 
who is unused to city ways and city habits ? 

I know the impatient frown which will come 
upon many faces as this is read ■ but all that I 
say is true. I have heard country girls talk of 
coming to the city for employment, giving as 
one reason that they wanted more social life. 
Well, that is just what they will not get; the 
woman of business is not a woman of leisure, 
and she has no time for society. She will find 
more social life in her own home, even if she be 
a worker, than she could ever have in the city, 
and there is no lonesomeness more absolute 
than the loneliness of a stranger in a crowd. 
Salaries are not large enough to permit of much 
relaxation in the way of entertainments, and 
after the day's work is over one is too tired to 
go in search of enjoyment. In the country 
home, in these days, the daily paper and the 
magazine comes, so that one may keep in touch 



SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 27 

with the world, even if she be at one side of the 
bustle and confusion of city life. The fashion 
articles tell her how to dress her hair and make 
her gown, and gives her the latest notions in 
small toilet details. No town is so small that 
it has not its public library, where all the new 
books come ; and the lecture and concert are 
not infrequent in visits. Railways and tele- 
graphs have brought the corners of the earth 
together, so that one is never very far away from 
the centers of things. There are occupations, 
too, for the girls who stay at home, and particu- 
larly those who stay in the country, and these 
will be talked about by and by. Do not throng 
to the cities in search of employment, for you 
will be doomed to bitter disappointment. The 
country stores employ women, as well as the 
city stores, and many a girl makes a good be- 
ginning in them. I myself know country towns 
where, a few years ago, nearly every position in 
the stores were held by young men, which to- 
day are held by women. Everywhere it has 



28 SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 

come to be quite the accepted state of things, 
that women shall sell goods. 

In the city stores the rules governing the 
duties of the various employes are arbitrary. 
And they are always rigorously enforced. The 
law has taken the matter of child-labor into its 
protecting hands, so that now, no boy or girl 
under fourteen may be permanently employed. 
That, then, sets the date of the girls beginning. 
The cash girls are, as a rule, fourteen and fif- 
teen years of age. Their duty is to run on 
errands, carry bundles from counter to counter 
for customers, and be at the beck and call of 
the salesmen or women. In the days before 
money was sent to the desk by machinery, the 
girls had to carry it to the desk and bring 
back the change and the parcel. But notwith- 
standing this duty has been taken from them 
in many stores, the girls still have enough to do 
and they do not find many idle moments. They 
have to be at their post all ready to begin work 
when the store is opened, As most stores open 



SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 2g 

at eight o'clock this means being there at cer- 
tainly quarter before eight. They must report 
to their superintendents, put away their street 
garments, and be at their places at the unlock- 
ing of the door. The time of their arrival is 
marked against their names, and if they are late 
they are fined a small sum. In some places 
they are allowed to work out the fine, by short- 
ening their dinner hour by as many minutes as 
they are late, but in other places this chance is 
not given them, and the fine must stand. All 
day long they are on their feet flying about here 
and there, and I don't believe anybody is glad- 
der when the big gong gives the signal to lock 
the doors than are these young girls. For these 
long hours and all their work, they receive two 
and a half or three dollars a week, and this 
must oftentimes be made smaller by the fines. 
If a cash girl prove herself bright, clever and 
capable, she may look forward to being ad- 
vanced into a position as stock girl or sales girl, 
or given a place in the mail-order department. 



30 SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 

The "stock girl," as she is called, has charge 
of the stock, for a certain counter. She must 
see that this counter is well supplied, and she 
must keep the goods in order. She must pos- 
sess wachfulness, deftness, and pride in the at- 
tractive appearance of her goods. Her hours 
are the same as all the rest, and she has from 
five to six dollars a week. 

It is usually the ambition of every cash girl 
to become a saleswoman ; that is, if she has any 
marked adaptability for the business. It is a 
proud day when she is allowed for the first time to 
attend upon a customer and to supply her wants. 
When she makes her first trial, she usually proves 
whether she has the stuff for success in her or 
not. Many eyes are upon her. The hours that 
the saleswoman has to keep are the same as those 
of the cash girl, and she is subject to the same 
rules, until she arrives at the head of a depart- 
ment, when a little more latitude is allowed. 
The same system of fines prevails that governs 
the cash girl. One would think that when a 



SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 3 1 

girl had been given a position of dignity and 
responsibility that there would be no need of 
anything like discipline ; but it is found neces- 
sary, to the shame of the workers be it said. 

Discipline varies in different establishments. 
In some it is almost military in its severity and 
its perfectness. The girls are not allowed to 
converse with each other except upon topics 
connected with the business ; at other stores 
they may chatter as much as they please ; they 
are supposed not to neglect customers, but they 
often do, or else betray such an utter indiffer- 
ence to the customer's wants that she goes 
away irritated without making her purchase. 
I had a funny little experience once in a Boston 
store. I wanted to match some silk to ribbons, 
and I went with my pattern. As I entered I 
was met by one of the proprietors who is known 
to me, and we walked along to the ribbon 
counter together. I handed my sample to a girl 
there, who did not look up, but reaching it back 
to me said rather curtly : " We've nothing like it." 



32 SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 

" But you haven't looked," I persisted. 

She was about to persist also, when an odd 
look on the face of one of the other girls made 
her glance at me. As she saw the proprietor 
standing by my side, she turned very red, mur- 
mured a confused apology, and began hunting 
for the ribbon which she very soon found. 

I didn't pity her distress one bit; I think I 
was rather glad that she was caught in that way. 
It will probably be a lesson to her and she will 
be more careful in the future. 

Quite in contrast to this was a scene I wit- 
nessed in another large establishment. I was 
waiting for a friend who was to have a cloak 
tried on ; it was not quite clone, so we sat 
until it should come downstairs. A lady came 
in with a little girl for whom she wished to pur- 
chase a cloak. The child was large of her age 
and difficult to fit; but the saleswoman who was 
attending upon her never lost her patience at 
all. She tried on, and tried on ; she was as 
interested as possible to please the customer; 



SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 33 

she made suggestions, and did all in her power 
to give the mother exactly what she wanted. 
The result was she made a good sale, and at * 
the same time secured a constant customer. 
Do you suppose that the lady will ever go 
to that establishment again without asking the 
same one to serve her? Of course she won't. 
It is women like this one who make themselves 
valuable to their employers ; and they are the 
ones also, who are steadily advanced, and who 
come at length to be the heads of departments. 
They are the women who get the larger salaries ; 
for they are worth the most money. They con- 
trol a certain amount of trade. Customers will 
wait for them if they are busy, and will not 
trade with any one else. 

In most of the large stores the proprietors 
know just how much each salesman or woman 
sells every day, and in that way it is very easy 
to keep track of her value to the firm. When 
girls complain because their salaries are not 
raised when some other girl is advanced, they 



34 SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 

do not take it into account that they have not 
made themselves of value to those who employ 
them. 

There is something very mean in the mere 
giving of eye-service. It is a species of dis- 
honesty. With an honorable employer honest 
service cheerfully given is nearly sure to meet 
the reward of advancement. I know that it is 
difficult to always be pleasant of voice, eye and 
bearing, that it is not easy to feign an interest 
one does not feel — but the thing to do is to 
feel the interest. Make the customer feel that 
you are as anxious that she shall be pleased as 
she herself is. It will be much easier to please 
her. There is no reason why the purchaser and 
the one from whom she makes her purchase 
should regard each other as natural enemies, 
and each be constantly on the lookout for some 
fancied insult or slight. If each would exercise 
patience and charity they would get on well 
enough. There is no need because a girl takes 
a position in a store that she shall proclaim a 



SALESWOMEN AND CASH GIRLS. 35 

declaration of independence by her deportment 
to every customer — she can't afford to doit. 
Courtesy, self-respect and an interest in her 
business are the conditions of ultimate success, 
and no girl need fear failure if she has these 
added to a natural ability to do the work she 
has undertaken. She will not only succeed, 
but she will win for herself friends who will re- 
gard her with admiration and respect, and will 
make her, in their thoughts, at least, the pattern 
for other women of her class to model them- 
selves upon. 



CHAPTER III. 

ARTISTIC AND HYGIENIC DRESSMAKING. 

IN every town and village are young women 
and girls who are anxiously asking what 
they can do in their own community to earn a 
livelihood. The big, outside world has no at- 
traction for them. They either want to keep 
in the shelter of the home, or else there is some- 
body for whom they themselves must be the 
home-keepers. Circumstance, rather than de- 
sire or ambition, must be the governing power 
of their lives. If you would know how large is 
this army of waiting women you should pass a 
day at the Women's Educational and Industrial 
Union in Boston, and get Mrs. Osborne to tell 
you of the appeals that come for help from 
Maine to Oregon, from Michigan to Florida. 

36 



ARTISTIC AND HYGIENIC DRESSMAKING. $1 

The burden of it all is, "Tell me what I can do 
at home to earn some money." 

I would like to tell you how the Union comes 
to be besieged with applicants. I am sure the 
story will interest you, and you may some of 
you find a word of needed warning and advice 
in it. Three or four years ago all the news- 
papers in city and country, daily and weekly, 
were filled with advertisements headed " Work 
at Home," and saying that if women would send 
either one dollar or two as the case might be, 
she would receive outfit and instruction for art- 
work to be done at home, and that after they 
had learned, they would be supplied with work, 
and could earn a nice bit of money at home. 
Well, you can have no idea how the responses 
came in ; the dollars literally poured into the 
hands of the advertisers. In return a piece of 
very coarse velveteen, stamped with a pattern, 
and a few needlefuls of silk would be sent with 
directions for working ; when this piece of em- 
broidery was finished it was to be sent to the 



38 ARTISTIC AND HYGIENIC DRESSMAKING. 

supply company, with another dollar, and if it 

was satisfactory permanent work would be 

t 
given. In almost all the cases there was no 

return for the dollar. It very rarely happened 
that the work suited, or if it did no reply came, 
and nothing more was heard from the money sent. 
In hundreds of instances the dollar or two could 
not be spared and meant such sacrifice as few 
of us can understand. Presently this matter 
came to the notice of the Women's Union in 
Boston, and it set to work to stop the business. 
It got all the evidence it needed, and then it 
sent lawyers to the places. In most cases no 
responsible persons could be found, so nothing 
could be done by law. It went to the news- 
papers and got the advertising stopped, and 
got articles written about it. It couldn't get 
the money back for the poor women who had 
sent it, but it could prevent others from being 
duped. In this way the Union became known 
all over the country, and women began to write 
to the Union for work. Of course the Union 



ARTISTIC AND HYGIENIC DRESSMAKING. 39 

could not supply them ; it could only point out 
to them what to avoid. 

There was one thing else plainly shown by 
the flood of answers which came to this fraudu- 
lent advertising. That was, not only were there 
hundreds, yes, thousands of women wanting 
work, but the majority were anxious to do 
"art" work of some kind. Good honest work, 
that was genuinely practical, found little favor 
in the eyes of the multitude. Somehow any- 
thing that was " art," no matter how bad art it 
was, hadn't the flavor of labor about it. If it 
was work at all it was "genteel" work and 
"ladies" could do it. Now, girls, honestly, 
isn't that feeling a very silly one ? Why, if one 
finds it necessary to do anything for money, not 
stand up squarely and face the fact, and do the 
work that comes to be done, whatever it may 
be, in a straightforward fashion, instead of 
dodging about under all sorts of make-believes, 
and pretending to be what one is not ? 

I referred to the misuse of the term "ladies" 



40 ARTISTIC AND HYGIENIC DRESSMAKING. 

in a former chapter ; just here I want to empha- 
size it. It is improper, a mistake in language, 
to speak of yourself or of any other person as 
"ladies" in connection with work of any kind. 
The term " lady " presupposes leisure. In the 
same way the word "gentleman " carries a like 
significance. Now you know very well that the 
term " gentleman of business" is never used, 
and you certainly never hear of " salesgentle- 
men." Isn't the very sound ridiculous ? And 
yet your man of business often is the polished, 
well-bred man of society, with a position which 
no one can dispute. You can be well-bred 
women, even if you are work-women. You 
may be "ladies" at your leisure. But it isn't 
the insistence on the term that will make you so. 
On the contrary, the very use of the term in 
connection with work stamps you at once as 
ignorant if not ill-bred. 

A few years since I was passing the summer 
at a well-known seaside resort, and in a sudden 
emergency I wanted some laundry work done. 



ARTISTIC AND HYGIENIC DRESSMAKING. 41 

I rang for the bell-boy of the hotel and asked 
him to see if the laundress could do it for me at 
once. He soon returned with the following 
reply : 

" I am sorry, Mrs. White, but the washer- 
lady is out." 

Yes, I know you are laughing at the ridicu- 
lousness of it ; but take care that you never 
make yourself ridiculous in a similar fashion. 

And now, if you are prepared to take up your 
work in true dignified work-woman fashion, I 
have a suggestion to make to those of you who 
have quick eyes, deft fingers and a true taste ; 
I might add also, an artistic instinct, but I am 
getting to be a bit afraid of expressions of that 
kind — they are quite apt to make mischief. 
Still there is an art-side to the occupation I am 
about to suggest, but it must be taken sensibly, 
and not to the sacrifice of every thing else. I 
know you are expecting something delightfully 
new, and I can fancy I hear a murmur of dis- 
appointment when I say — dressmaking! 



42 ARTISTIC AND HYGIENIC DRESSMAKING. 

Well, but you must understand that there is 
dressmaking and dressmaking. It is not the 
old-fashioned kind that I am about to commend 
to you, but the new, which has originality, idea 
and principles about it. The principles are 
beauty and comfort, the idea is becomingness 
and health, and all of it combined constitute 
the originality. I dare say you have all heard 
of " Dress Reform," and have grown to have a 
horror of the term because it has stood for 
ugliness pure and simple, and for crankiness 
unadulterated. Well, it isn't called Dress 
Reform any more, but " artistic and hygienic 
dressing." This phase of it began with Mrs. 
Flynt when she invented the waist that should 
take the place of corsets. It was to be adapted 
to the figure, rather than force the figure to be 
adapted to it. Mrs. Flynt was wise in her day 
and generation; she saw that interesting inva- 
lidism for women was going out of fashion, and 
that healthfulness was to become a fashion. 
She foresaw the generation of tennis-playing, 



ARTISTIC AND HYGIENIC DRESSMAKING. 43 

horseback-riding, mountain-climbing girls, de- 
voted to gymnastics of all kinds, that was to 
rise up, and she wisely made ready for them. 
Room to develop, room to grow was the prin- 
ciple upon which she " built " — as the English 
woman would say — her waist. She did not 
start a crusade against beauty — no, indeed ! 
" Have everything as pretty as you like," she 
said, " but be true to Nature." At first women 
eyed the waists askance ; they were suspicious 
of any innovation on old methods ; but by de- 
grees they became interested, and the best 
proof of Mrs. Flynt's success is the large num- 
ber of patent health-waists that have been put 
upon the market since Mrs. Flynt started, and 
the numbers that are sold. 

But that was only the beginning ; and it has 
been left another woman, to Mrs. Annie Jen- 
ness Miller, to make a rounding-out of the 
idea of proper dress. If there is anybody in 
the world who does not believe that a healthful 
dress can be a pretty one, I only wish she could 



44 ARTISTIC AND HYGIENIC DRESSMAKING. 

see some of the delicious gowns that Mrs. 
Miller evolves from that keen, artistic brain of 
hers. They are sin-ply wonders. They keep 
close enough to the lines of Fashion not to 
seem queer ; but each gown is original and pict- 
uresque, having in it the very essence of grace- 
ful and becoming dressing, at the same time 
it is on the most strictly hygienic principles. 
Now there are hundreds of women who would 
like to adopt Mrs. Miller's dress-plan, but their 
dressmakers turn up their noses at it, and it is, 
thus far, as a rule, impossible to get such gowns 
made. There are a few of the most fashionable 
dressmakers in Boston and New York who are 
seriously studying the idea ; but they are the 
wise ones who look ahead, and who see what 
is coming, and are going to be ready. 

I venture to say that the reason why so few 
take it up is because it does require originality 
and artistic instinct to be successful in this 
line of work. But the girl or woman who is 
artistic in her feeling, and who has the gift 



ARTISTIC AND HYGIENIC DRESSMAKING. 45 

of expressing this feeling has here a field open 
before her that she will find very remunerative. 
It requires more skill to make dresses in this 
way than in the old stereotyped fashion, because 
much depends upon individual expression. I will 
assure you that success lies in this line of work, 
for no one who sees the models of the dresses 
but becomes at once enamored of them, and is 
straightway in despair because she cannot have 
them. " There is nothing that prevents hun- 
dreds of women taking up this dress," said Mrs. 
Miller a few weeks since, " but the impossibility 
of finding dressmakers who will attempt them." 
That gave me the idea at once of suggesting 
this occupation to artistic girls all over the 
country. Here is an opening field that is, as 
yet, practically unexploited. So many other 
occupations are overburdened with workers. 
Here is one asking the workers to come into it. 
You see that I was right when I told you there 
was dressmaking and dressmaking. One wants 
to understand the principles of fitting, but must 



46 ARTISTIC AND HYGIENIC DRESSMAKING. 

be thoroughly emancipated from the idea that 
the only fitting is over a tight corset. Of course 
it goes without saying that one must be a good 
needlewoman, must have an eye for color com- 
binations, and must be able to adapt styles to 
different individuals. After that the work is 
simple enough. Mrs. Miller publishes in her 
magazine, Dress, all her new models, so that it 
is easy to follow her, and the girl with origi- 
nality may design for herself. If she have the 
ability to do this she will be more valuable to 
her customers than if she be only able to follow 
other people's models, and she may command 
a large price for her work. 

There is hardly a town of any size that will 
not support at least one dressmaker of this 
kind, and she may either go to her customers 
by the day, or she may have them come to her 
at her own house. Good dressmakers get all 
the way from two dollars to five dollars a day, 
according to their ability and their originality. 
These are city prices, but I suppose there is 



ARTISTIC AND HYGIENIC DRESSMAKING, 47 

no place where a good dressmaker would have 
less than the first-named price. You see a girl 
could have a good income, and make herself 
invaluable to her employers. At the same time 
she is doing something satisfactory, and is ex- 
ercising her love for the beautiful and refined, 
and, with right governing ideas of what is beau- 
tiful in a gown, it must be a real delight to work 
on the pretty stuffs that are used nowadays. 

Think this matter over, girls, and see if it 
isn't a happy thought for some of you. If you 
know nothing of the matter send to the Jenness- 
Miller Publishing Company in New York for a 
copy of the magazine, Dress, and in that you 
will find what you will need to put you in the 
right way. I am sure that more than one girl 
will find her financial and business fortune in 
this work, and also that she will be grateful that 
it comes under the head of " home work." 



CHAPTER IV. 



NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 



AMONG all the professions that have been 
opened to women during the past few 
years, none seems on first sight so tempting as 
that of newspaper work. I do not say "jour- 
nalism," for that is a term with which I have 
little sympathy. It is too dilettanti ; too little ex- 
pressive of the real thing. Your genuine news- 
paper worker is an honest worker ; there's no 
make believe about him or her. As for your 
"journalist," well, he's very likely to think 
more of his title than his achievement. One of 
the best editors whom it is my good fortune to 
know, has a fashion of saying, if any one speaks 
of a " journalist " to him, " Oh ! a journalist, is 
he? Well, he won't suit me, I'm afraid; what 
43 



NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 49 

I'm looking for is a good, wide-awake newspaper 
man." 

So what I want to talk to you about is news- 
paper work. In the beginning, by way of pre- 
face or apology, I am going to say that there is 
some danger that there will be a good deal of 
" I " in this paper. But as most of it is drawn 
from personal experience, the presence of this 
obtrusive little personal pronoun cannot very 
well be helped. 

There is more than one reason why this 
profession should be regarded as a pleasant 
one, although it is a question whether the rea- 
sons are "good and sufficient." In most cases 
they are based on wrong premises, and are ar- 
rived at through ignorance of the whole affair. 
In the first place many persons think it an 
easy way to earn a livelihood ; they think the 
remuneration greater than it really is ; others 
think it a work that brings influence with it, and 
still others regard it as a somewhat less objec- 
tionable mode of work than that done with the 



50 NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 

hands, and are very fond of setting off mental 
labor against the purely manual labor. Others 
again are ambitious of position and think it a 
fine thing to have, as they term it, "the public 
ear." Now anybody, man or woman, who 
takes up this profession with any ideas of this 
kind is very far astray, and will make a speedy 
and signal failure. 

It is one of the best professions in the world. 
It is one which catches and holds the enthusi- 
asm of its workers as nothing else does. It 
opens possibilities of attainment that are un- 
dreamed of when the first steps are taken. But 
it is a profession that must be undertaken with 
humility of spirit, and treated always with the 
highest respect. It cannot be used as a make- 
shift ; it will do nothing for the One who takes 
it up carelessly, or to serve a purpose, and 
drops it after the purpose is served, or some 
other position won. It gives much to its honest 
workers, but to the others it refuses its best gifts. 

After twenty years of constant work in the 



NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 5 1 

profession which I chose when very few young 
women had dreamed of choosing it, I am come 
more than ever to believe that it is a profession 
specially suited to the woman who suits it. 
You see I don't say all women, for not all 
women will make successful newspaper workers, 
any more than all men will. It is not an easy 
work, albeit it is fascinating. It, more nearly 
than any other I know, will answer the descrip- 
tion given of women's work in the old doggerel 
which ran, 

" Man's work is from sun to sun, 
"Woman's work is never done." 

This is really true of newspaper work. It is lit- 
erally never done. Your paper goes on through 
everything ; it is printed every day, and some- 
times several times a day, as in the case of the 
paper with which I am connected, The Bostoii 
Herald, which has eight editions every day. 
Can you understand what that means ? Some- 
thing fresh and new in every one. The last in- 



52 NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 

cident caught even in its happening, chronicled 
in white heat, and put before the waiting public 
before it is two hours old. Nothing must 
escape ; every class in the community must be 
looked after from the merchant-prince to the 
rag-picker. Do you realize what this requires? 
Quickness, alertness, and more than that, if you 
will let me coin a word, aliveness. A readiness 
to do whatever may come to you, to turn out 
an interesting story on any subject, to make 
the most of trifling incident, in short, to give 
value to every piece of work put into your 
hand to do. 

Here, for instance, is a sample of what may 
come to a worker, what has come, in fact; and it 
is no exaggeration. Busy on a " special," as a 
long article to be ready for use at any time, is 
called, you are interrupted by the call from the 
managing editor's desk. You answer the sum- 
mons and find your superior officer with an open 
letter in his hand. 

" I have just heard," he says, " that there is 



NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 53 

every likelihood that Mrs. will be put on 

nomination for the School Board. It is to be 
done suddenly, and isn't generally known. We 
want to be prepared for the emergency, so will 
you go out and get a sketch of her to use this 
afternoon ? Get a full column, more if you can, 
and see what her views are on such and such 
points," naming them over. " And, by the way, 
such a person," naming some distinguished in- 
dividual, "is to arrive this afternoon. Can't 
you see him and get a little interview ? Have 
it for the morning. Perhaps you'd better go to 
the station to meet the train ; and while you're 
waiting you might run into Harmony Hall and 
see what is going on there." 

Well, off you go. To facilitate matters you 
take a carriage and go to the house of the pro- 
posed candidate for school committee. She 
has just gone to see some one who is interested 
in her nomination, and off you start after her. 
Perhaps you catch her at this point, and per- 
haps, which is much more likely, you have to 



54 NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 

follow her elsewhere. You find her, get your 
points speedily, back you go to your desk, for- 
mulating your sketch in your mind meanwhile. 
It's pretty near lunch time ; but there's no time 
to think of anything but that sketch ; there is a 
little over an hour in which to catch the edition 
you want, and at least a column to be written. 
You lock your door and begin. Somebody 
knocks, and you keep on writing ; nothing short 
of the crack of doom or the managing editor's 
bell will stop your pen. You and Time are 
having a fine race, and, being a true newspaper 
worker, you win. Hurrah ! the last line is 
written, five minutes to spare. You carry the 
copy to " the desk," there's no time for blue 
pencil, and up it goes to the composing room. 

And now for a good luncheon. But what is 
this? The city editor appears; somebody is 
ill, an assignment overlooked ; won't you take 
it, please ? There's really nobody else ; every 
one is out or busy "catching the edition." It 
will take you a mile in the opposite direction 



NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 



55 



from which you are to go to capture your " inter- 
view " that is coining on the train ; good-by, 
luncheon. A cup of coffee, or a plate of soup 
is hastily swallowed, if there is that time to 
spare, if not you go without it. You get the 
points needed, write them out on your lap in 
the horse-cars, then go on to the interview, with 
" Harmony Hall " by way of diversion. Luck- 
ily for you there isn't much going on there — a 
paragraph will dispose of it — so on you go. 
You are in time for the train, you look about, 
there's nobody from any other newspaper there. 
Your spirits rise, you've scored a point. In 
comes the train. Your " interview " is amena- 
ble, asks you to drive to the hotel and talk on the 
way. It's astonishing how much information 
you can get in a very little time. Correct infor- 
mation too, just what your public wants. And 
here is a point which I desire to give to the 
would-be newspaper girl. You are of little 
value to your paper unless the information you 
get is perfectly correct and reliable, and unless 



56 NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 

you know and understand the points which the 
public and the paper not only want to know, 
but have the right to know. 

Well, you go back with your material and 
write out your interview. Perhaps you think 
since that is done you will be at liberty. It 
may be that you will ; and it may be also that 
you will be asked to go somewhere in the even- 
ing and write an account of a lecture, a party, 
a convention, a fancy fair, or a revival. That is 
the newspaper day, and pretty much every day. 
Now whatever else you may believe, do not 
take it up thinking that the work is light or easy, 
for you will have a sad and speedy awakening. 
In regard to any personal gain of influence or 
recognition, that comes slowly. In taking a 
position on a newspaper you are but one of 
many workers, and you have your own place to 
make. In the first place you must make yourself 
of value to your employers, your editors. You 
must show them that you have within you the 
quality which will when it has had experience 



NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 57 

develop into good working power. This you 
must prove in small ways before you will be 
given large opportunities. The mere fact that 
you have been taken on to a paper does not 
make you a newspaper woman. You are " on 
trial " merely, and you must prove your mettle 
well before you are admitted fully to the inner 
circle, and recognized as an accepted worker. 
Some women who have an ambition to be "jour- 
nalists," seem to think that the whole thing is 
accomplished if they can write something that is 
printed, and then have personal notes of them- 
selves put into the papers, saying of them that 
"Miss Assurance of the Tattler" says so and 
so. Nobody knows who Miss Assurance is, 
but what does she care ? She has been in 
print. She calls that " being famous," and 
she speaks of her connection with the Tattler 
in a way that is very funny to those who know 
the truth of the matter; namely, that this "con- 
nection " consists of the acceptance of an un- 
paid contribution, or the occasional request for 



58 NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 

the notice of a small concert or an insignificant 
book, the payment consisting in a couple of 
tickets for the entertainment, or the volume to 
be reviewed. It seems queer that persons 
should be content to pose as "journalists " on 
such very slim pretenses as these, but there are 
many who do, and I don't want any of my girls 
to join this army of incompetent hangers-on 
and make-believes. And now if you are ready 
to become conscientious, honest, newspaper 
workers, I will deal with something beside neg- 
atives, and tell you what you must do. 



CHAPTER V. 

newspaper workers (continued), 

AND now, my girl with newspaper am- 
bitions, what have I to say to you ? 

A good deal, if only I can say it within the 
allotted space. Having made up your mind 
that the work is not easy, but that it is exacting 
and insistent, being assured that although you 
may make a comfortable living you will not 
make your fortune, and knowing perfectly that 
your personality is to be swallowed up in the 
paper for which nevertheless you are willing to 
do your best work, you are ready to hear me, 
and I hope will listen with the feeling that what 
I say is true, and that it is for your best good. 

You must of course possess the ability to write 
well, that is to express yourself in good English, 
59 



60 NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 

free from all redundancies, with clearness and 
conciseness. Fine writing is not wanted ; by 
" fine writing, " I mean the tendency to the use of 
excessive metaphor, flowery language, and long 
words of a foreign extraction. It may not be 
easy for you to believe — but you will agree with 
me after a few trials — that the simplest mode of 
expression, that which is elegant and refined in its 
simplicity, is the most difficult of attainment. 
If you watch yourself, you will find that the 
tendency is to amplification and redundancy of 
expression, rather than to simple conciseness. 
You would learn the lesson very quickly could 
you be an invisible listener to the criticism of 
the " desk editor," on a piece of work over 
which you had spent much time, and of which 
you felt very proud. Doubtless every dash of 
his relentless blue pencil, through lines over 
which you had toiled and which had given you 
most exquisite satisfaction as you read and re- 
read them, would give you strange pain. You 
would stand and writhe in mental agony to 



NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 6l 

hear all this brain labor of yours characterized 
as "gush," in a tone of unmistakable contempt. 
But you would most certainly grasp the idea 
that what the paper wants is lucid statement, a 
clear bit of description, and an idea understand- 
ingly presented. Mind, I am not advocating 
careless work or work without thought, but the 
work which has to be most carefully done, and 
so well written that no one can find fault with 
either the essence of it, or the mechanical 
construction. 

To be a successful newspaper woman, and by 
that I mean one that is versatile, and can be put 
to do work of any kind on any topic, one must 
be fairly well-read, must be up in historical sub- 
jects, must have some ideas about the movements 
of the time, and must be quick to catch the spirit 
of things. I know many well-read, highly-edu- 
cated women, whose ideas are worth a very 
great deal, but who would never make good 
newspaper workers, simply because they never 
can be made to have any idea of relative values 



62 NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 

of things. They do not know how to take the 
public pulse ; they have no genius for selection ; 
and so while they are valuable friends for news- 
paper workers to have, who can learn much 
from them and take the available knowledge 
which they are usually ready to give, they can 
do no practical work themselves. You know, I 
dare say, from experiences of your own, that it 
is not always the person who knows the most 
who can best impart information. One must 
know how to give out, as well as to take in, to 
make a good teacher, and the same qualities, in 
a great degree, are necessary to make a good 
newspaper woman. 

It requires good physical as well as good 
mental endowment, to make a career success- 
ful. No one who has not a good constitution, 
unimpaired health, and a perfect nervous sys- 
tem should ever think for a moment of entering 
this profession Even all this is very likely to 
be thoroughly tested if one enters the rank and 
file of the workers, and is held by office require- 



NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 63 

ments and rules. In no profession does one 
have so much to meet in the way of physical 
disadvantage as in this. No matter what the 
weather may be, if a piece of news is needed, it 
has to be got. Papers, especially the dailies, 
don't wait on the weather clerk's convenience, 
they "do" in spite of him. Often there is a 
great irregularity in eating ; hours of labor are 
uncertain. You are at the behest of others, 
and you must always be ready to respond. I 
consider it only right to put this all before you, 
for it is better to know that there is a " seamy" 
side to things, before you undertake the work, 
than to fancy it all smooth and even before you 
begin, and find out your mistake afterwards. 

But if you have splendid health and no nerves ; 
if you are well-equipped mentally ; if you are 
ambitious to learn your profession, and willing 
to begin with the alphabet of it; if you will 
understand that your remuneration will be 
small at first, and that severe economy will be 
necessary in order to get on ; if you are free 



64 NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 

from the nonsense which possesses so many 
girls, then you may undertake the work, and 
feel sure that there is no more delightful pro- 
fession in the world, nor one in which you may 
succeed better than in this of newspaper making. 

In this paper I am not considering the 
literary worker, she who writes for magazines or 
story papers; nor the one who, in the shelter of 
her own home, writes letters for daily papers. I 
mean the young woman who goes into the news- 
paper office, has a desk there, " takes assign- 
ments," and goes out and attends to them ; going 
to her work as the young men go to theirs, and 
working side by side with them. 

I believe in beginning at the very beginning of 
things. You may be a little inclined to turn up 
your nose at being sent to describe a store 
window, or to make a paragraph about a re- 
moval. But it is all in the way of education, 
and when your superior officer, your city editor, 
finds that you do the small things understand- 
ingly you will be given larger things to do, and 



NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 65 

it rests with yourself to make your work valu- 
able, and in this way to advance your own 
position. The trouble is so few are willing to 
begin at the beginning ; they want to strike in 
somewhere along in the middle, or they will 
make a bound for the very top — and often come 
down quite outside the bounds of the profession. 
I have in mind a young woman with "journal- 
istic" — mark the word — aspirations. She 
had had little or no experience, but she made 
up her mind to begin as art or musical critic. 
She found all such places occupied, but she 
didn't see why the people who had grown up to 
the knowledge of the work, and were of value to 
their papers, shouldn't step aside and give her a 
chance. With the insolence of inexperienced 
and uninstructed youth, she really thought that 
her claim was the greater, because she was 
" new and fresh " — very fresh, if one may drop 
into newspaper slang — and that those people 
who had the wisdom born of experience should 
be put one side in favor of her youth. She was 



66 NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 

quite indignant because it was suggested that she 
win her place by showing her ability to do any 
kind of newspaper work first. Now a girl like 
that will not ever become the good newspaper 
woman ; she never will gain the position she 
desires. While she is standing outside with 
folded hands, waiting for somebody to die or 
resign and so leave an opening for her, another 
woman, or a man, may be is fitting for the place 
which will be hers or his because he has won it. 
Positions don't come by way of legacy in a 
newspaper office, I assure you. 

Having once obtained the chance to make a 
trial of your powers, it depends upon you to 
make the trial a success, and your position a 
permanency. In the first place do everything 
as well as you can. Put as much good work 
into a report of the most trifling nature, as 
you would into an important editorial. Carry 
your conscience with you all the way along. 
Never let any feeling of private pique or private 
personal interest enter your work. You are a 



NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 67 

part of the paper which you represent, and you 
must give your work all the dignity and imparti- 
ality that belongs to the paper. There is 
nothing a good editor resents so quickly as the 
feeling that any member of his staff is using 
the position occupied as a means of carrying 
out private schemes, whether it be of advancing 
an interest or pulling down a reputation. You 
must be above small prejudices and personal 
pique in your professional career, no matter 
how much you may indulge in them in your 
private capacity. 

Above all things do not try to enhance your 
own interests by writing about yourself and 
your own affairs and accomplishment in any 
paper with which you are connected. There is 
nothing which so quickly opens a person to 
ridicule as the habit of constantly writing about 
herself. Some persons think this fame. It is 
simply the most palpable and laughable kind of 
self-laudation. The editors who allow any 
personality of this kind are few ; it is often 



68 NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 

seemingly allowed when really it is overlooked 
and escapes the editor's notice. It ought never 
to be allowed, and no girl should show such a 
lack of good taste as to allow herself to make 
this very pitiful bid for notoriety. 

In regard to remuneration, which is what 
every possible worker wishes to know about, it 
will be found to be much less than is generally 
imagined. There have been so many sensational 
stories written concerning the money earned by 
writing that hopes are very high. But here the 
truth is to be told — the number of women who 
are earning less than one thousand dollars a 
year is very much greater than those who are 
earning that amount. A girl has to work some 
time, unless she has an unexpected piece of 
good fortune, before she will earn as much 
money as a school teacher, and she will work 
all the time — with a possible two-weeks vaca- 
tion — instead of having the long vacations and 
the "off" days which the teacher has. The 
newspaper women of Boston who earn one thou- 



NEWSPAPER WORKERS. 69 

sand dollars a year and over may be counted 
on the fingers of one hand, and all of them 
are women who have served a long apprentice- 
ship — none less than ten years, the most even 
a longer one. 

And still, to the girl with the true newspaper 
instinct, and with health, ability and high 
principle, I would say choose as your profession 
this the best of all, and you will find your place 
if you seek it honestly, industriously, modestly 
and conscientiously. It is a work that pays you 
for the doing, not only in the money you earn, 
but in the pleasure and profit you gain from it, 
so you undertake it in the right spirit, and by the 
right methods. 

I speak to you out of twenty years of experi- 
ence, so I feel that I speak " by the book." 



CHAPTER VI. 

STENOGRAPHERS AND TYPE-WRITERS. 

WITHIN a few years a new industry has 
sprung up which has proven very at- 
tractive to a large number of young women, who 
have turned to it as a pleasant means of earning 
a livelihood. I mean stenography, or short- 
hand, and type-writing. Perhaps it would be 
better to speak of these as two occupations, 
rather than as one ; for although it follows, 
almost as a matter of course, that the stenog- 
rapher uses a type-writer when she writes out 
her notes, it does not equally follow that every 
girl who uses a type-writer is also a stenographer. 
It is better for her if she is, as she will be more 
accurate when working from dictation, although 
it doesn't matter if she is only a copyist. 
70 



STENOGRAPHERS AND TYPE-WRITERS. 7 1 

The great danger with this, as with so many 
other new avocations, is that it will become 
over-crowded, and as a consequence the pay- 
will be diminished. It is one of the laws of 
political as well as social economy, that if the 
supply is in excess of demand, the value of the 
work is lessened. I think you can all under- 
stand this without any difficulty. And you may 
feel that you know one of the underlying princi- 
ples of political economy ; that bugbear that 
you hear talked about so much. 

Nothing shows so plainly the number of 
women and girls who either need to earn money 
because they must be bread-winners, or who want 
to earn it in order to be independent, as the 
rush to take up any new industry that is offered. 
There is no thought of fitness for the work ; the 
idea is simply that of getting employment that 
shall pay. The idea of special preparation does 
not occur to the majority of young women who w 
undertake work of any kind, except of course a 
profession, where one cannot get on without 



72 STENOGRAPHERS AND TYPE-WRITERS. 

work beforehand, and careful study. And right 
here is found one of the reasons why women are 
so seldom advanced in their position. They do 
not take up the work with the earnestness that 
men do ; it is more often than not a temporary 
make-shift; a something that must be done to 
bridge over a certain time of waiting, usually the 
time that elapses between school and marriage. 
It is not regarded as a permanent thing, and the 
girl very openly says that she accepts a position 
of the kind only until such time as the coveted 
position of wife is open to her. Now in one way 
that is all right and natural. There is no one in 
the list of employments, in all that come to a 
woman's hand to do, so important or beautiful 
as that of making the home. But it must 
come naturally, and it must not be too openly 
anticipated. The work meanwhile must be just 
as faithfully done, as much heart and brain put 
into it, as if one expected to do it forever. It 
makes the way easier for other women who have 
to follow in some foot-path of toil, and it adds 



STENOGRAPHERS AND TYPE-WRITERS. 73 

to the self-respect of the worker, as well as to 
her value to her employers. So while I would 
not have you look lightly upon the most royal 
gift that can come into your life, neither would 
I have you stand in an attitude of waiting ex- 
pectancy, but go on in a dignified fashion, 
rounding out your life in every way, until the 
great glory of perfected womanhood comes into 
your life ; then take it, feeling that it is yours by 
divine right. 

Stenography is, in truth, a profession. It re- 
quires hard study and long practice to make 
one proficient. It is not easily acquired, and it 
is really a great memory test. Experienced 
stenographers say that two years is a reason- 
able time in which one may expect to work fairly 
well after beginning study. To be sure there 
will be work that one may do in less time, but 
it is not safe to attempt very long pieces of work 
— except of course for practice — in a much 
less time. To be sure some persons learn more 
readily than others, but I am speaking now of 



74 STENOGRAPHERS AND TYPE-WRITERS. 

the average pupil. Now type-writing, which is 
a purely mechanical labor, can be learned in a 
few days ; and it is only a question of practice 
when one may become an expert. As I have 
said, not all type-writers are stenographers ; and 
in some cases there is no need that they 
should be. I know one young woman who can 
write from dictation, on the type-writer, as fast 
as any one can dictate, and not once in a hun- 
dred times miss a word, or make a mistake. 
She works entirely from dictation, and she has 
a salary of fifteen dollars a week. She con- 
siders this good pay. There are times during the 
year, when if she were not steadily employed, but 
worked " by the piece," she could make much 
more money during a week, but when the unem- 
ployed weeks and the dull weeks are taken into 
consideration, she really would average no more 
a year than she does under the present arrange- 
ment and possibly not so much. At any event, 
she feels much better satisfied to know that she 
has a fixed sum upon which to depend than to 



STENOGRAPHERS AND TYPE-WRITERS. 75 

feel the anxiety, which one cannot help feeling 
whose employment, and consequent income, is 
more or less spasmodic. Right here let me say 
that this salary is considered large. A bright 
young woman, who is an expert stenographer 
and type-writer, tells me that the number of 
girls who get less than ten dollars a week is 
larger than those who get even that sum. 
Eight, nine, and ten dollars a week are the 
most frequent wages, while the girl who gets 
steady occupation at twelve, fourteen and fif- 
teen, feels that she is indeed in luck, and that 
her fortunate star is in the ascendant. This 
young woman herself gets fifteen dollars a week, 
but she has a very important and onerous posi- 
tion as confidential clerk in a large newspaper 
office. You can see at once that large intelli- 
gence, with information, and clear common 
sense, are needed. Both the young women of 
whom I have spoken are more than ordinarily 
well educated. They are good French and Ger- 
man scholars, know something of the classics, 



76 STENOGRAPHERS AND TYPE-WRITERS. 

and have a good knowledge of English litera- 
ture and history. And I wonder if you girls, 
who have an idea of taking up either one or 
both of these branches as a means of liveli- 
hood, understand how necessary a knowledge of 
nistory and literature is to you. The better 
informed you are on these topics, the wider will 
be your opportunity. A gentleman who had 
been engaged on a special piece of literature, 
in which he employed a type-writer, said to me 
that he had no idea of the difference of attain- 
ment in young women who did this work until 
he had this experience. When he began he 
employed a young woman who had been recom- 
mended to him quite highly. In some respects 
she was very good. She was accurate in follow- 
ing him, but she was not a good speller, and she 
never knew if her employer made a mistake in 
date or event, as will sometimes happen to even 
the most careful. He had to carefully revise 
her work, and take out everything of which he 
was not altogether certain. While the work 



STENOGRAPHERS AND TYPE-WRITERS. 77 

was in progress she was taken ill, and she sent 
him a substitute. He says that her illness was 
his salvation. The substitute went far ahead of 
her predecessor. She was quick and alert ; not 
only did she write rapidly, but she was ready to 
challenge mis-statement, and she often made 
the suggestion that gave a needed point. " It 
was a delight to work with her," said the gentle- 
man, " and when the work was done, I paid her 
more than she asked, for I felt if the first one 
had earned that sum of money, surely this one 
had earned much more." 

I asked one of my type-writing girls some 
questions, and I am going to give you her own 
words to me. She has been in the work some 
time, and has occupied her present position 
over two years and is very highly valued by her 
employers. 

"Tell you about type-writing? Certainly. 
Is it a good business for a girl ? Well, that 
depends. You see it must be a good girl for 
the business, in order to make it a good busi- 



78 STENOGRAPHERS AND TYPE-WRITERS. 

ness for the girl. There are the two sides of 
the matter. There must be natural qualifi- 
cations, else the girl will not succeed. You 
don't expect every man to make a good doctor, 
or minister, or lawyer, or newspaper man, do 
you ? Certainly you don't. Every man cannot 
succeed as a stenographer or a type-writer ; 
neither can every woman. It requires a good 
memory, an ability to spell well, a knowledge of 
the rules of grammar and rhetoric, a generally 
good education, and by that I mean an under- 
standing of affairs and a knowledge of events, 
especially historical, a quick eye and hand and 
no nerves. You see the list of requirements is 
a long one, and each one is imperative. Many 
girls are attracted to the work because they 
think it a pleasant way of earning money, and 
because it seems a step in advance of so many 
other things ; a girl, for instance, would rather 
say that she was a type-writer than that she 
sewed in a shop. It is one of the class of 
intelligent professions that presupposes a cer- 



STENOGRAPHERS AND TYPE-WRITERS. 79 

tain amount of education. Not all who begin 
the study carry it through — this refers partic- 
ularly to stenography — and many who do 
carry it through, getting to the end of the 
course some way or other, do not make it avail- 
able after they finish. The fault is not in the 
method by which they were taught, but in them- 
selves ; they haven't the requisites. When they 
come to be put to practical work, they make 
sad failures. 

I am always sorry for these girls ; I only- 
wish they could have known their unfitness 
before spending time and money in study. 
Another important quality needed, especially if 
one takes an office position, is discretion. 
Naturally one hears a great deal about people, 
and unavoidably learns much not only of their 
character, but of their private affairs, and it 
should be understood that this knowledge is to 
be put out of the mind as speedily as possible. 
Why, a stenographer could make no end of 
trouble for individuals if she were not discreet. 



8o STENOGRAPHERS AND TYPE-WRITERS. 

Some people seem to regard a confidential clerk 
as a sort of receptacle into which they may 
pour their real opinions about everybody with 
whom they are connected in a business way. 
When you come to think of it, isn't it queer that 
a man should talk in so unguarded a manner 
concerning any one with whom he has business 
relations ? I suppose he realizes that he trusts 
certain knowledge of his own affairs to a con- 
fidential clerk, and he must of necessity believe 
in her integrity and honor. So you can easily 
see how necessary discretion is. I'm not sure 
but that I should have named it first in degree 
of importance." 

I think these words from one of the workers 
will be better than all the theoretical words I 
could give you. I will add just a few words 
given me by Mrs. Isabel C. Barrows, one of the 
most expert stenographers in the country. She 
is the woman who took down a speech of Carl 
Schurz, delivered in German, in English short- 
hand — one of the most wonderful pieces of 



STENOGRAPHERS AND TYPE-WRITERS. 8 1 

stenographic work ever done by man or woman. 
She is also a teacher of stenography, in the 
little time left from her editorial duties. She ' 
says the reason why so many women fail is that 
they have not acquired, as a rule, the habit of 
practical thought as men have. The whole 
plan of woman's education up to the present 
time has been insufficient and superficial, while 
men have been trained in harder schools and 
more thorough methods. As a consequence, 
the masculine thought-habit is better developed, 
and the qualities most needed in this special 
work are more common in man than in woman. 
This is not the fault of women so much as 
it has been the misfortune of their training. 
That all of them have not suffered from this 
wrong method is proved by the good work done 
by so many. 

The great trouble is, as I hinted in the 
beginning, that so many girls, impelled by the 
success of the few, which has become traditional, 
rush into the work without stopping to consider 



82 STENOGRAPHERS AND TYPE-WRITERS. 

whether or not they are fitted for it. It is, as 
my type-writing girl said, an idea that pleases 
them, and they take up the business without con- 
sidering their capacity. But for those who suc- 
ceed, it is a pleasant employment, and as things 
go, fairly remunerative. 



CHAPTER VII. 

PRESERVES AND PICKLES. 

THE stay-at-home girl is thinking by this 
time, no doubt, that she should have 
a little attention paid to her and her special 
needs, so I will devote a few pages to her now. 
I cannot tell you how strongly this girl, or 
woman — for sometimes it is the mother of a 
family upon whom the burden of bread-winning 
rests — appeals to me. She is hampered by so 
many circumstances; she cannot go out into 
the world to do her work, for duty holds her 
where she is, and there she must stay. Conse- 
quently her choice of occupations is circum- 
scribed; she can do only what comes to her 
to be done. 



83 



84 PRESERVES AND PICKLES. 

is embodied in the personal experience of one 
woman. Many, I think, may draw counsel and 
help from the story. But I want to say just 
this first : look over your stock of accomplish- 
ment and see what you can do best, and try to 
turn that to your advantage ; see if you cannot 
make it pay you something. You will take notice 
that I say accomplishment, and not accomplish- 
ments. I mean literally the something that you 
have done, and done well, no matter how small 
or humble it may be, not the showy veneer that 
passes current, under the name of "the accom- 
plishments." No ; I insist upon the literal defi- 
nition of the word in this case. 

A lady whom I know tells the story of a 
friend of hers who was unexpectedly left in a 
position where self-support became imperative. 
For a time she was bewildered. She could play 
the piano, she could paint, both somewhat bet- 
ter than well ; she was a graceful letter writer 
with a pleasing knack of expression that some 
of her friends took for talent. But she could 



PRESERVES AND PICKLES. 85 

make none of these "accomplishments " avail- 
able. She could not obtain pupils enough to 
pay her either for her time or her trouble, and 
the editors of newspapers and magazines did 
not find the peculiar charm about her work that 
her friends declared it possessed. She was 
almost at her wits' ends, and was really beginning 
to think that there was no place in the world 
for her, when she suddenly found her vocation. 
And what do you think it was? Simply this : 
frying potatoes. Humble enough, wasn't it ? 
and unpromising. But a good deal came of 
it. She could fry potatoes in the special fash- 
ion called " Saratoga chips," deliciously, and 
among her own friends her fried potatoes were 
quite famous. One day it occurred to her to 
take orders for them, and see what she could 
do. Her friends were glad to get her delicious 
fried potatoes, and she had very soon a small 
but paying business. Then her fame went out 
into the large city near by, and she supplied 
families there. The business increased so that 



86 PRESERVES AND PICKLES. 

she was obliged to take in assistants, and she 

is now on the high road to prosperity, just be- 

t 
cause she could do one thing, though a very 

simple one — better than her neighbors. Now, 

I don't for a moment suppose that every woman 

who wishes to earn her living at home is going 

to preparing " Saratoga chips " for the market. 

I tell this only to show you what may be done 

when a person has one thing in which she can 

excel others. 

Nor was it the story I started to tell you; 
it came along naturally, in passing, and was so 
to the point that I could not refrain from tell- 
ing it. 

My especial story is for the young woman 
who lives in the country, and who has an oppor- 
tunity to get at berries, and small fruits ; per- 
haps lives on a farm where they are raised, or 
may be, with work and care. The woman I am 
going to tell her of, lives on a pretty little 
"home farm" of a few acres just outside the 
busy city of Pawtucket in Rhode Island, and 



PRESERVES AND PICKLES. 87 

not far from Providence. She had been a book- 
keeper in one of the Pawtucket mills, at a large 
salary, and had married and settled down on 
the home farm. Accustomed as she was to a 
busy life, and above all to being the mistress of 
a pocket book of her own, she soon found herself 
missing it, and wishing that she had something 
to do. Like the woman with the " Saratoga 
chips," she found her vocation quite by acci- 
dent. Her mother had been a notable New 
England housewife, whose cooking and, above 
all, whose pickle and preserve-making were 
famous in the neighborhood. Her daughter 
had inherited this peculiar ability, and was as 
proud of her store closet as her mother had been 
before her. It happened, one autumn day, as 
she was making a special kind of pickle, which 
was liked by all the friends who had the good 
fortune to taste it, one of her neighbors came 
in to call. She began comment upon the pickles, 
bewailing her own ill-luck in making them, and 
ended by saying how she did wish that it was 



88 PRESERVES AND PICKLES. 

possible to obtain some. It was at that instant 
the money-making idea came into Mrs. Thorn- 
ton's head. 

" I will make some for you," she said. 

" You ! " replied her friend. 

"Yes; why not? You want pickles, I want 
occupation." 

And so the thing was settled, and so soon as 
others heard that she was willing to undertake 
the work they came to her with orders, and she 
found plenty of pickling to do. Then came 
requests for catsups, sauces and relishes and 
she filled those orders. 

Her neighborhood success set her to thinking 
seriously, and during the winter she laid her 
plans. She saw friends in Providence and 
took orders for jellies, preserves, pickles and 
things of a like nature, and she made arrange- 
ments with the Woman's Exchange to send her 
any orders they might get, and also to take 
what she might have to spare on sale at their 
rooms. As soon as the spring opened she be- 



PRESERVES AND PICKLES. 89 

gan her work. She looked after her strawberry 
beds and her raspberry and blackberry vines. 
She looked to see that her fruit-trees were in 
condition. She tended her cucumber vines and 
her tomato plants. Her garden had come to 
mean something more than merely the append- 
age to the family comfort ; it was to be the basis 
of supplies for the new business. 

All summer she worked ; as the fruit ripened 
she " put it up." The strawberries, most delicate 
of all fruits, she picked herself, hulling as she 
picked, so that they need be handled but the 
once, and taking great care that they should 
not be crushed. Currants she allowed others 
to pick for her, and so with the hardier fruits 
that would not be harmed by the handling. She 
used the greatest care in making her jellies and 
her preserves, and the results were most satisfac- 
tory. From the time the first fruit ripened, until 
the last pickles were made in the early autumn, 
she was constantly employed. It proved to be 
a remunerative employment. The second year 



90 PRESERVES AND PICKLES. 

her business increased, and now she has all she 
can do. She might enlarge it, but she does not 
care to undertake to do any more than she can 
do herself, as she fears that if any one undertook 
it with her the results would be less satisfactory 
than they are. Like a sensible woman, she con- 
cludes that enough is as good as more, and she 
makes sufficient money during the busy months 
to keep her all the year through, and let her do 
what she likes in the way of improvement of her 
place, of journeying about in her leisure sea- 
son, and of having many things in the way of 
luxury that otherwise she would have to go 
without. To be sure with her the work was 
not a real necessity ; but the result would have 
been the same if it had been. She had, too, the 
advantage of owning the place, but there are 
other women who have the same advantage. 
There is many a woman living in the country 
who, although not the owner of a farm, has a 
garden spot which she might devote to the 
growth of small fruits, and turn these into money 



PRESERVES AND PICKLES. 9 1 

by making the preserves and jellies that will 
find a ready market at good prices. 

Mrs. Hinckley in Dorchester, just outside of 
Boston, does a large business. She has regular 
private customers whom she supplies by order 
every year, and the Women's Educational and 
Industrial Union takes all she can spare from 
her private customers, and finds a ready sale 
for it. Another woman in Cambridge, who does 
precisely the same thing. 

Of course not every one who lives in the 
country even, can do this. One must have 
patience, and the natural aptitude for cooking, 
to be successful in this business. It never fol- 
lows that any one can do a thing well, simply by 
wishing to do it, but there are enough who can 
do just this thing well, to make it worth their 
trying. It is not very difficult to find cus- 
tomers ; the women who are never successful 
in putting up fruits will gladly avail themselves «a 
of the skill of those who can. Nearly every 
one, too, has friends in town or city, who will 



92 PRESERVES AND PICKLES. 

be glad of the genuine country fruits, well pre- 
pared, the fruit fresh, the sugar good, and with 
the home care that makes the difference be- 
tween the work well done with good results or 
carelessly done with indifferent results. Then, 
too, the business does not last all the year 
around, and there is well-earned leisure for 
study and other work. It is absorbing while it 
does last, and it takes the time in the summer, 
the pleasant part of the year, when one feels 
the least like exertion possibly. But one is will- 
ing to work to reap such results. It is a good 
plan, if one lives near a large town, to make 
an arrangement with some leading store to 
keep the goods on sale, if one has more than is 
needed to fill private orders. People in towns 
buy preserves and canned fruits in quantities 
from the stores ; would they not prefer, if they 
knew it was obtainable, the carefully-prepared 
home preserve, rather than that prepared in bulk 
at some factory, and put up by wholesale in 
hap-hazard fashion? Of course they would. 



CHAPTER VIII. 



GUIDES AND SHOPPERS. 



ABOUT a year ago people coming home 
from Europe had a good deal to say 
about the " lady guides " of London. It seems 
that some bright, educated women, feeling the 
need of earning money, had the idea of forming 
an association of lady guides, whose business it 
should be to show strangers, particularly ladies, 
about London and its suburbs, extending their 
duties even to remote points if desired, although 
the field which they particularly undertook to 
cover was the city itself. The idea proved a 
most happy one, and the women connected with 
it speedily had all they could do. In these days 
of electricity it takes an idea but a short time 
to travel ; and so eager are women for all the 
93 



94 GUIDES AND SHOPPERS. 

new employments that are opened to them that 
they no sooner hear of any experiment in an in- 
dustrial line than they go ahead to try it for 
themselves. The work in London was reported 
in New York, when straightway it was taken up 
there, and an association formed which is called 
" The New York Ladies' Guide and Chaperon 
Bureau." It has issued a circular which it is 
sending about, and I am going to quote from it 
so as to give the girls some notion of the work. 
It is even 'more far-reaching than the one in 
London, and has added quite a number of new 
features. The managers of the Bureau are 
Mrs. Hardy and Mrs. Carolyn Faville Ober, and 
they have an office at No. 24 Union Square, 
East. The circular informs the public that 
their guides have a practical knowledge of the 
history of all important places of interest, and 
being armed with the association's badge and 
credentials, receive a more cordial recognition 
than the mere stranger. From these advantages 
and from the varied experience among shops of 



GUIDES AND SHOPPERS. 95 

all kinds, the benefit to be derived is self- 
evident. The circular goes on to say : 

" Our chaperons, selected with the utmost 
care, place at the disposal of young ladies, 
whose mothers or guardians are unable to ac- 
company them, the facilities so often required 
of going to the theater or concert. Young 
ladies are escorted from and to their homes ; or 
school children to and from school. 

" We will send out home or foreign excursion 
parties of ladies under the care of experienced 
chaperons, who will attend to all ordinary and 
necessary details. 

"We undertake to furnish choice seats for all 
places of amusement, to send carriages when- 
ever desired, to direct permanent or transient 
guests to, or engage rooms at, the best hotels 
and boarding-houses; to secure railway and 
steamboat tickets and berths, to meet at the 
depot strangers coming to the city, and to make, 
when required, all arrangements for their com- 
fort during their stay. 



96 GUIDES AND SHOPPERS. 

" The bureau can be used to great advantage 
by those living in the suburbs, expecting friends 
whom it is desirable they should meet. By tele- 
phoning to the bureau, a chaperon can be sent 
who will conduct the visitor from one station to 
another, and save time and money for the patron 
without discourtesy to her friend. 

" There are many ladies living out of New 
York, who wish to make purchases here, but are 
unable, or find it inconvenient to come to the 
city. For such we shall be glad to execute with 
promptness and dispatch shopping orders, large 
or small ; and consequent on arrangements made 
we are able, with great advantage to our patrons, 
to select any kind of musical instrument. 

" A new and important feature of our work is 
to provide lady experts to assist in, or take full 
charge of, the interior decoration of a house ; 
furnishing it throughout ; selecting books for 
libraries, etc. 

" Attention is paid to the receipt and forward- 
ing of mail matter. 



GUIDES AND SHOPPERS. 97 

" Elocutionists, lady pianists and singers sup- 
plied for entertainments. 

" Suburban ladies who desire to change their 
toilettes for city entertainments can make use 
of our rooms. 

"There is no aid or service that one woman 
may be able or required to render or perform 
for another, that will not be cheerfully under- 
taken, and the best efforts made by us to give 
satisfaction. 

" To make the bureau really of service, charges 
will be moderate ; the following being the sched- 
ule of charges : 

" Guides for shopping and sight-seeing, accord- 
ing to competency, $3.00 to $3.50 and $4.00 per 
day. 

" Guides who will act as interpreters, 50 cents 
to $1.00 a day additional. 

"Deductions made for weekly engagements. 

" Chape ronage to the theater, $1.00. 

" Chaperonage of children to and from school, 
per week, $2.50. 



98 GUIDES AND SHOPPERS. 

" Directing to boarding-house, 25 cents. 

" Securing room and board, 75 cents. 

"Securing seats for the theater for one or 
more, 50 cents. 

" Use of room for changing toilette, meeting 
dressmaker, etc., 50 cents. 

" Physicians and lawyers recommended 50 
cents. 

" Type writing 5 cents per folio. 

" Shopping orders executed for 5 per cent, on 
the amount purchased. 

" Meeting ladies at station, accompanying 
young ladies and children, or any brief service 
will be charged at the rate of 40 cents an hour. 

"Carriages procured, railway, steamship and 
berth tickets secured, and general information 
given, free of charge." 

This circular is issued by an association ; but 
the rules and the scope of work may give a hint to 
some young woman of what she herself may do. 
She might not be able to undertake so much, but 
she could select what she could cjo. Yet not 



GUIDES AND SHOPPERS. 99 

every young woman can undertake the task of 
entertaining people, for this is practically what 
a o-uide must do. There are certain indispensa- 
ble requisites. In the first place one must be 
well-educated, able to talk well, understanding 
all the history of places which she is to show. 
She must be well-bred and courteous, and she 
must have some knowledge of human nature. 
She must possess kindliness and tact. Meet- 
ing many different kinds of people she will 
need all these qualifications. If she is in a 
large city she must know what is going on at 
the various theaters and places of amusements, 
so as to know just where to take her party. 
She must know the picture galleries, keep run 
of the art exhibitions, and she must know the 
best shops for bargains. All this a bright, 
quick city woman may learn, and she may keep 
her knowledge at her fingers' ends. 

Having these requisites, and being sure also 
that she has a fund of cheeriness and good tem- 
per, and is ready to meet any emergencies that 



IOO GUIDES AND SHOPPERS. 

may arise, she may start on her work. Of course 
she must find a way to gain patronage. She 
would do well to make friends with the leading 
hotel people, and the best of the shop-keepers. 
Let her have cards prepared, stating what she is 
ready to do, giving as references the name of 
her clergyman, and one or two men or women 
whose names will carry weight. Let her leave 
these cards at the hotels, and let her also insert 
an advertisement in the leading papers. Then 
she should be at the various hotels at certain 
stipulated hours to see if any one needs her. 
All this time friends are speaking for her, and 
if she has any acquaintances in outlying cities, 
she has asked them to recommend their friends 
to her care while in town. In this way it will 
not take long to work up a good business. Two 
or three young women might act together, and 
find enough to do. Strangers are always com- 
ing from all over the country to the various 
cities. Men bring their wives and daughters 
when they take a business trip, and they are 



GUIDES AND SHOPPERS. IOI 

obliged to go about by themselves while the 
husband and father is transacting business, or 
to stay in the hotel waiting until he can return 
to them and take them about. Now a compe- 
tent and agreeable lady guide would be a "per- 
fect blessing" to a party of this kind. All the 
time could be well employed, they would see 
just the things that are best worth seeing, and 
the head of the family would have freedom for 
his business duties, and not be concerned for 
the welfare of his family. Every body would be 
pleased, and the guide make her money easily. 
It should not need to be said, but alas ! the 
necessity does exist for saying it, the guide 
must take care to be well and quietly dressed. 
She must look and be the refined gracious 
woman who for the time is acting the part of 
hostess, and she must remember that to be any- 
thing less than refined in her outward appear- 
ance would be an insult to her guest, or to the 
person who for the time occupies the position 
of guest. 



102 GUIDES AND SHOPPERS. 

A dark cloth gown, tailor-made, with wrap to 
suit, and bonnet to match, nice linen, gloves 
and boots, and you are ready. Wear a bonnet 
rather than a hat, for it is in better keep- 
ing both with your costume and your employ- 
ment. A bonnet is always ladylike ; while there 
is an informality about a hat that is not appro- 
priate to the occasion. Your prices you can 
take from the circular that I have given you. 
It is a fair list. Of course it is understood that 
your party pays your expenses, the car fares, 
lunches, etc. That is, she may allow you to do 
it, but you must keep the account and settle the 
expense at the end of the day. 

As you will not, probably, be employed as 
guide constantly, you can add to your duties 
those of shopping on commission. In this your 
friends outside the city will be of great service 
to you. They may influence people to send to 
you, and thus enlarge your business constantly. 
When you are well established you may be able 
to make such terms with the leading houses as 



GUIDES AND SHOPPERS. 103 

will induce them to give you a commission on 
sales, in addition to the commission you receive 
from the shoppers, and in this way you may 
make your income from both sides. Of course 
the houses would not do this until they found 
your business was a valuable one ; unless, in- 
deed, you should happen to know the heads of 
the firm, and they feel willing to do this for you 
to help you establish yourself. 

I know one woman who makes a good income 
by shopping on commission, and doing nothing 
else. She not only shops for out-of-town peo- 
ple, but she has a set of families in town for 
whom she shops. She goes every morning to 
their houses, receives her commissions, and 
goes out to fill them. In this case she is paid 
a certain salary, because she must report every 
morning for duty whether there is anything to 
be done or not. Each family pays a small stated 
sum — two dollars or two dollars and fifty cents 
a week and car fares — and with several families 
to serve this makes a good income. 



104 GUIDES AND SHOPPERS. 

You will understand that the successful shop- 
per must be a person of taste, must know the 
very latest fads and notions, and must possess 
good judgment in selection, and an artistic eye 
in matching. 



CHAPTER IX. 

PROFESSIONAL MENDERS. 

IT is time to turn again to that class of work- 
ers who do not want, or cannot take, steady 
employment away from home. The plan that I 
am going to suggest may mean absence from 
one's household a few hours at a time, but so 
much may be done at home that the other hours 
do not really count. The work is a homely one, 
but it is extremely useful, and is in the interest 
of economy. The stock in trade is a capacious 
work-basket with scissors, thimble, thread, silk 
and cotton tape, buttons all kinds and sizes, and 
all the other little appliances that naturally be- 
long to such a basket, deft fingers, and an un- 
limited stock of patience. With these at hand, 
you may set yourself up in business as a pro- 
io 5 



106 PROFESSIONAL MENDERS. 

fessional mender, and if you manage it properly, 
you will soon have a large class of customers 
and plenty to do. 

It was Miss Josephine Jenkins who wrote in 
the Boston Herald : 

" With all the wish in the world to earn money, women 
let many ways of doing so escape their notice simply be- 
cause they are lacking in practical application. Here, for 
instance, is one means by which an honest penny, if not 
an entire support, could be obtained : It is to become a 
visiting mender. And what does that signify ? asks the 
impecunious seeker of fortune. What is the ' visiting 
mender ' ? Nothing more nor less than an angel with a 
thimble, and who is skillful with the needle, who goes 
from house to house to mend the family stockings, sew 
on buttons and repair whatever needs repairing in the 
week's wash. That is the visiting mender, and a much- 
needed individual in hundreds of households, where the 
mother would rather pay fifty cents for a quick morning's 
work than to waste her own precious time taking stitches. 
A regular seamstress is, perhaps, too expensive, but the 
visiting mender, deft of hand, comes within the possibility 
of the average household. Any lady who understands 
the art of darning and mending would soon find this sort 
of business paid. Such a vocation may be humble, for it 
does not demand a ' higher education,' but it is one to 
command respect, and would certainly be appreciated by 



PROFESSIONAL MENDERS. 107 

many women whose own employments give them no 
chance to apply the stitch in time that is believed to save 
nine. Young mothers who would like to keep up with 
the procession, but find the mending-basket an obstruc- 
tion, and the gayer butterflies who have no taste for 
replacing missing buttons on their boots and gloves, are 
some of the people who would bless such a visitor as the 
professional mender. " 

Now Miss Jenkins knew what she was talking 
about ; she knows it by experience, just as I do, 
just as all women do who lead busy lives, and 
have to let some things go because they cannot 
possibly attend to every thing in the world. 
You and I both know that bright women may 
do a good deal, may, in fact, almost achieve the 
impossible, but there is, after all, a point' at 
which they must stop. I remember once look- 
ing over all my dresses to find one to put on. 
Something was the matter with every one, and 
the matter finally resolved itself into the puzzle 
which could be made ready to put on with the 
least outlay of time. A friend, who was the Art 
Critic on one of the leading Boston dailies, was 



Io8 PROFESSIONAL MENDERS. 

waiting for me. As she saw my despair deepen, 
her own feeling found expression in words. 

" I would give a good slice out of my salary, 
and so would you," she said, " to find a woman 
who would come with scissors and thimble once 
a week and put us in order. Who wouldn't ask 
a single question, but would go through closets, 
and drawers, and stocking bags, and shoe bags, 
and would mend the holes and sew on the miss- 
ing strings and buttons, replace the bit of frayed 
braid, sew up the rip in the pocket, brush the 
flounces, and make everything ready to put on. 
But such a woman isn't to be found. I have 
tried and I know. I have suggested it to half 
a dozen or more women who have come to me 
wanting something to do, and such a sniff of 
disdain as I receive. They all want to be com- 
panions, or copyists, or something 'genteel,' 
until I am so tired of them and their mock pre- 
tentions that I don't know what to do. They 
are dying to get something to do ; work is a 
necessity ; they appeal to my sympathy, and yet 



PROFESSIONAL MENDERS. 109 

when I show the work that lies right at their 
hand they refuse to see it, and make me feel 
as though I had insulted them by the mere 
proposition." 

And that has been so much the case. I know 
my friend was right because I have had a like 
experience, and it is the testimony of many 
other women. It is annoying to a busy woman 
to have to stop to sew on the missing button 
when she is in great haste and her work of the 
utmost importance. It is aggravating beyond 
measure, when she is so tired after a day's hard 
mental labor that she can hardly see, when every 
nerve is quivering under the lash of stimulation, 
to make a longer day with the needle in repairing 
something that must be made ready for the next 
day's wearing. Oh ! if the other woman could 
but be found to meet this woman's needs. I 
have not exaggerated ; every woman whose days 
are filled with mental labor will tell you the 
same story. There is a disinclination to manual 
exertion, that becomes positive physical pain, 



IIO PROFESSIONAL MENDERS. 

after a day that has been so wearing alike to 
brain and nerve. And the worst of it is one 
can never make the rest of the world know the 
absolute torture that she is suffering, at the very 
thought of physical exertion. And it is the help 
that comes in ways like this, that one is so ready 
to pay for, if one can only get it, that makes the 
real rest. 

And there are men that feel this need as well 
as women ; young men who live in boarding- 
houses, and have no one to look after their 
clothing and make the needed repairs. They 
would make a good and a willing class of cus- 
tomers ; it could be easily arranged that the 
work for this class could be taken to one's 
home, and then returned when it was finished. 

A young woman in New York, who evidently 
took the sensible view of things, already has a 
very good and paying business among just this 
class of persons. She has made her own way, 
and has been very successful. 

I have had one or two women tell me that 



PROFESSIONAL MENDERS. Ill 

they tried to do this work, but they could not 
get it. 

" How did you try? " I asked them. 

" Oh ! I put an advertisement in the paper, 
but nobody answered it." 

Well, that isn't so very strange. An adver- 
tisement of that sort gets easily lost to sight in 
the midst of so many " wants " as appear in the 
papers. Personal endeavor is what is needed, 
and that was what won for the New York girl of 
whom I have just spoken. Perhaps you would 
like to know just what she did, and how she did 
it. You know, in this world, we all build our 
own endeavors upon the lines of some one else's 
success. It is perfectly natural. Life is, after 
all, a sort of serious game of " follow my leader," 
and what is already done or achieved, it is quite 
a matter of course that some one else tries. 
And so for the way in which the girl I have told 
you of went to work. In the first place she 
didn't advertise. She got some cards printed 
with her name and address, and her business on 



112 PROFESSIONAL MENDERS. 

them. These she took to the large stores and 
gave them herself to the clerks, at the same 
time explaining her project. She then said she 
would call at a stated time for the work. Of 
course it was an experiment; she did not know 
how it would succeed, but she felt that it was 
worth the trying. L wish I could remember the 
list of prices that she gave on her card, but 
the only thing I can remember was that the 
stocking mending was from five to ten cents a 
pair, according to the amount to be done. Of 
course all the prices were small, but the aggre- 
gate she thought might be good. She came for 
the bundles at the promised time, and the very 
first day she had her shopping bag, a good-sized 
one, much more than full, so she had to have a 
separate parcel made. These she returned at 
the promised time, and the next week she had a 
still larger quantity, so that she had to have the 
bundles sent by a messenger boy. Her work 
has increased until now she has a boy constantly 
employed to get and return the parcels, and has 



PROFESSIONAL MENDERS. 113 

two assistant menders. Now what one woman 
has done, another may do if she will only go to 
work in the right way. i 

This occupation rightly managed need not be 
an unpleasant one. To one who loves her needle, 
it may be very delightful. The art of mending, 
in our day, is a much neglected one, but it was 
one of which our grandmothers were very proud. 
Fine mending was a species of exquisite needle- 
work, and it ranked with embroidery in nicety 
of detail. The old-time gentlewoman could 
mend any thing, from household linen to lace ; 
she darned stockings until it was a delight to 
see the fine stitches, and she set a patch abso- 
lutely by the thread. The mending-basket was 
an indispensable article, and it was always well- 
stocked. Did the least bit of wear show itself 
in the table-linen, it was taken in hand at once 
and darned to a new strength. Did body linen 
wear, a patch was set in so neatly that the gar- 
ment never had the appearance of an old one. 
To mend well was an accomplishment of which 



114 PROFESSIONAL MENDERS. 

every woman was proud. The advent of the 
sewing-machine, while it was undoubtedly a 
great saving of time to many women, did, never- 
theless, do more than anything to lessen the 
respect for hand sewing. Still a few old- 
fashioned people have always insisted that cer- 
tain parts of the sewing shall be done by hand, 
so that a few have kept up the practice. In the 
cities the teaching of sewing in the public 
schools has made good needle-women of the 
girls who are coming now to take their places 
among the world's workers, and with the knowl- 
edge of the work has come a respect for it, that 
is one of the most hopeful signs of the times. 
The girls in the schools are taught to mend 
and repair, as well as to make garments, and 
many of these may find a way to a pleasant 
support through the medium of her little shining 
implement of industry. The mending is recom- 
mended as something well worth thinking of. 

There are families who need such work done 
for them as well as the army of single men and 



PROFESSIONAL MENDERS. 1 15 

women. Many a tired, overworked mother 
dreads the sight of the weekly mending-basket, 
and would be very glad if she could get a few 
hours' help each week from somebody. I have 
heard many a woman say this, but she always 
ends by saying that she can find no one who 
will do it. She can easily get a seamstress or 
dressmaker by the day ; but she can't afford to 
pay their prices for the work she wants. If 
she could employ somebody by the hour, who 
would go away when her work was done, and go 
cheerfully because somebody else was waiting 
for her, it would be the greatest possible com- 
fort in the world. There is the same difficulty 
here that so often exists ; that of getting the 
employer and the worker together. " I know 
just what I want to do," a woman once said to 
me, after detailing a plan of work, " and I also 
know that there is somebody in the world who 
wants done just what I can do; now why won't 
some person set us toward each other, so that 
we may meet ? " 



Il6 PROFESSIONAL MENDERS. 

It is hard to answer that puzzle ; but usually 
the only " setting towards " is done by the worker, 
and it must be confessed that sometimes even 
with trying the result is long in coming. But 
there is also another thing, which may partially 
offset the slowness of attainment ; when once 
success has crowned effort, it is apt to increase, 
for when one gets the first chance, others are 
sure to follow. So in starting in as " visiting 
mender," or as the mender who takes her work 
home, you must recognize the value of the first 
patron. One brings another always, and if your 
work is done well, you will find your patrons 
increasing. 



CHAPTER X. 

REAL ESTATE BROKERAGE. 

PERHAPS a recent experience, related by a 
friend who bears " the girls " and their 
welfare quite near her heart, may show why it 
is that so many fail to make a good living in 
the world as independent workers, and become 
the grumblers and the hangers-on to the skirts 
of skilled labor. This friend had the misfortune 
to lose the secretary who had been with her for 
some time, and it became necessary to fill her 
place. One would think that out of the army 
of waiting and wanting women this would have 
been an easy thing to do ; but not so did she 
^ find it. She wanted a young woman who could 
do type-writing, write from dictation, copy legi- 
bly, and answer business letters. " Not a diffi- 
117 



Il8 REAL ESTATE BROKERAGE. 

cult position to fill," do I hear some of you say ? 

Well, so she thought when she began her search, 

i 
and so I thought, too, when she told me of her 

need. But she changed her mind before she 

had been long searching, and I had occasion to 

indulge in some serious thinking when she gave 

me the benefit of her experience. 

She had interviewed over half a hundred appli- 
cants for the position, but without success. One 
girl had never run a type-writing machine, but 
thought she could learn to use it in time by prac- 
tice ; one had been a housekeeper, but had an 
idea she would rather be a private secretary, al- 
though she wasn't much used to writing. But 
the most of them were utterly without an idea 
of what would be the duties, and were hope- 
lessly ignorant, not only of those requirements, 
but evidently of every other so far as work was 
concerned. 

One young woman came who said she needed 
a position ; she had finished school and wanted 
something to do. She must have it, indeed, as 



REAL ESTATE BROKERAGE. 119 

her people could not afford to let her be idle. 
She was young, prettily dressed, and had rather 
pleasing manners, and my friend was really in 
hopes that here at last she had found what she 
needed. She denned the duties. 

"But I cannot use the type-writer," was the 
first comment. 

" Are you quick to learn ? " queried my friend 
whose interest and sympathy had been awakened. 

" I don't know," was the reply. " I might try." 

" Can you write from dictation ?" 

"What's that?" 

" Can you write if told what to say ? " 

" I don't know ; I never tried." 

"Can you write a business letter?" 

" What do you mean ? " 

" Well, supposing you were my secretary, and 
I had a letter come from a publisher, asking me 
if I could do a piece of work, and how much I 
should ask for it, and I told you to say that I 
would do it, and gave you the price I should 
demand, what would you say ? " 



120 REAL ESTATE BROKERAGE. 

11 Why, dear me ! I don't know. I never did 
such a thing in my life," was the reply. 

Plainly she would not do as a secretary, but, 
having a soft heart for winsome girls, my friend 
thought perhaps she could help her by giving 
her employment in another direction ; there's 
always enough in a busy woman's household to 
be done, so she said: "Can you sew? Could 
you make some underclothing for me and help 
my dressmaker about my spring dresses?" 

u O, dear, no! my mother hires all my sew- 
ing done for me." 

"Well, can you assist about a house? can you 
cook ? " 

"O, no! I don't know anything about house- 
work; that is, not much. I set the table some- 
times." 

She was given up as a hopeless task, and my 
friend is still looking for a secretary. 

Perhaps this may seem exaggerated, but I 
assure you that it is not, and it is only one of 
several similar experiences. 



REAL ESTATE BROKERAGE. 121 

And with no better equipment, girls confi- 
dently seek for places and then wonder that 
they do not get them, or that having gotten them 
they do not succeed in keeping them. 

Now a young man would hardly venture in 
business life without some idea of what he was 
going to do, and he would expect to give some 
time at learning the profession that was to give 
him a livelihood. Why should a girl expect to 
come at once into a position that it would take 
a boy some time and a good deal of work to 
attain ? 

Please don't jump at a wrong conclusion now 
and think that I am making the sweeping asser- 
tion that all girls are unprepared for their work ; 
this is a very great mistake. I know that there 
are girls as well prepared as boys, but I know, 
too, that they are the exception rather than the 
rule. Girls do not take the idea of business so 
seriously as boys do. It is not the great thing 
for them ; it is not the life work. And yet it 
may be. No girl can tell when she begins at 



122 REAL ESTATE BROKERAGE. 

what time she may leave off. And at any event, 
to make success sure for herself, and the way 
easier for other girls who come after her, she 
should see to it that she does her work with 
care and with interest. You and I are not doing 
our work solely for ourselves; there is some- 
thing beyond individual interest, even if we 
refuse to recognize it. Our success or failure 
is not ours alone ; it is that of every other woman 
who shall come after us, working along the 
lines in which we have worked. What we do 
makes it either more difficult or more easy for 
them. We cannot afford to be selfish in our 
way of regarding this question, and to think 
that it makes no difference how we do, it is our 
loss and gain. If it were ours alone, we might ; 
but it is that of every other woman worker. 
Earnestness and determination are necessary to 
success, no matter in what line our work may 
be done. 

If I had been given the opportunity to speak 
to the young girl my friend told me of, I think I 



REAL ESTATE BROKERAGE. 1 23 

should have said to her that she would find it 
very hard to find the congenial work to do until 
she had proven that she could do well what came 
to her. If it was the housework assistance to 
an over-tired mother she should do that, and in 
doing it cheerfully and well she would find that 
she was ready for the next step, and the way 
would be opened for her to take it. There is 
really work enough in the world to do ; the 
trouble is to find the competent workers. 

But I started to make a suggestion, and I have 
had so much else to say that the thought almost 
was overlooked. A business that women are 
taking up, and are succeeding well in, is that of 
real estate brokerage. It certainly has no feat- 
ures that women would find difficult or unpleas- 
ant. There are two in Boston vicinity, who are 
doing remarkably well, and I think there are 
others in other cities; but these two I know 
personally, and I know just how successful they fc 
both are. One is Mrs. Woelper of Boston, and 
the other is Mrs. La Coste of Maiden. Both of 



124 REAL ESTATE BROKERAGE. 

them were in other business, and came into this 
gradually, and, from the nature of things, inevi- 
tably. Mrs. La Coste kept a fancy goods store 
in the city of Maiden, but her health failing, 
she was obliged to get some business that took 
her out of doors, and some friends gave her 
some houses to manage. She sold her own 
business, and managed so successfully with the 
estates in her hands, that others gave her op- 
portunities, and now she has all she can do. 
Mrs. Woelper is a Southern woman, born in 
New Orleans, but of Northern parents. Her 
husband was connected with one of the New 
Orleans papers, and when he died she found 
that she must look out for herself. She was 
given a position in the post-office in New 
Orleans, and she was an expert at deciphering 
illegible writing, so that her position was one 
of great responsibility. But she could not en- 
dure the confinement and all the time her heart 
was going out to New England, the birthplace of 
her ancestors. She had a little property in New 



REAL ESTATE BROKERAGE. 1 25 

Orleans, and she managed it so wisely that it 
yielded her a good return. She liked the work 
of looking after it, too, and when finally she 
made up her mind that she would give up her 
position and come North, she also made up her 
mind that she would go into the real estate 
business. To think and to act were simulta- 
neous, and she speedily found herself in Bos- 
ton, where she took an office, and began to 
advertise. She had a few friends, they helped 
her what they could, but the greater part of her 
work has been done by sheer persistent and 
untiring effort. 

There is a very good story told of her, that 
will bear repeating, since I am sure it will be 
new to you all ; and it will prove just what kind 
of a worker she is, and show the spirit which 
she has manifested all the time since she set 
out in her new business. 

It happened during the somewhat dull season 
of two years ago. A gentleman was talking with 
a real estate dealer quite prominent in Boston. 



126 REAL ESTATE BROKERAGE. 

" And so you say business is dull? " said he. 

" Yes ; there doesn't seem to be any one doing 
a thing except ourselves and that fellow Woelper, 
down in the Equitable Building," was the reply. 

" Indeed," said the gentleman, " is that so — 
by the way, do you know ' that fellow Woelper ' ? " 

" Never saw him," was the answer, " but I tell 
you he's a 'hustler.' " 

" Well, I know him *, supposing we go down 
and make him a call." 

So off they went, and you can imagine what 
the man thought when he found that his " hus- 
tler," "that fellow Woelper," was a very prettv, 
quite young woman, with refined manners, and 
a head as keen for business as his own. To use 
his expression when speaking of it afterwards, 
you might have knocked him over with a feather. 

Mrs. Woelper is an enthusiast in her business. 
She says it is hard work, and carries a weight 
of responsibility with it, but it is pleasant, profit- 
able and healthful. It compels the person who 
follows it to be a good deal in the open air, and 



REAL ESTATE BROKERAGE. 1 27 

keeps her well in spite of herself. Of course a 
' woman must have business ability ; she must 
have the tact that shall enable her to meet peo- 
ple pleasantly, and adapt herself to them. She 
must have a knowledge of market values of 
buildings and lands. She must understand all 
the laws that relate to the governing of real 
estate ; of the conveying of mortgages, and all 
the other business technicalities. She must 
be up in the science of drainage and ventila- 
tion, so that she may be able to judge of the 
sanitary conditions of a house ; but this is some- 
thing that every woman should understand, in 
order that she may protect herself and her fam- 
ily against the dangers that corne from bad 
drainage and poor ventilation. There is noth- 
ing in all this that a bright woman may not 
learn, and learn very readily. It sounds much 
more formidable than it really is. Neither Mrs. 
Woelper nor Mrs. La Coste have found any 
difficulty whatever in acquiring all the knowl- 
edge needed. They did not gain it all at once >, 



128 REAL ESTATE BROKERAGE. 

it has come by degrees as the need of it has 
been felt. Women are adaptable, very much 
more so than men, as a rule, and since this 
is true, there is no reason why they should not 
succeed as real estate brokers, since one of the 
greatest needs is that of adapting themselves to 
the persons with whom they come in contact. 
They must be as deeply interested in the man 
or woman who has a small place for sale, or who 
desires to purchase a cheap house, as they are 
in those who have the larger commissions for 
them. It is Mrs. Woelper's plan that every 
customer shall bring another, and she works 
constantly with that end in view. And, my dear 
girls, who purpose to go into business, that is a 
good plan to go on always. Said a merchant to 
me one day, after he had reproved a clerk for 
carelessness and inattention, and had met with 
the excuse that all the woman wanted was a 
paper of needles : 

" It isn't the value of the sale ; it is the fact of 
the sale. A woman comes here for a paper of 



REAL ESTATE BROKERAGE. 1 29 

needles ; if she is made to feel that it is a pleas- 
ure to serve her, she is coming again ; not only 
will she come herself, but she will send others. 
If I lose her because the needles are given her as 
though she had insulted the store by making so 
small a purchase, it is a pretty expensive paper 
of needles for me ; I don't care to pay the price." 
And that is true of all sorts of business trans- 
actions. If it is made pleasant the result is 
sensibly felt, and if it is made unpleasant, the 
result is just as apparent, and not satisfactorily 
so. Just bear that in mind, girls, and you've 
learned one lesson in the economies of busi- 
ness, and have obtained a principle that will be 
a help to you all the way through. 



CHAPTER XI. 

INSURANCE AND ADVERTISING. 

THERE is nothing in the world that gives 
one greater pleasure than to feel that 
some word spoken in earnest, and with a real 
purpose in it, meets with a response from another 
who seems to be waiting to catch just that word. 
It is such a blessed assurance that nothing is 
undertaken in vain ; that seed sowed seemingly 
at random finds mellow, waiting soil, and springs 
up, bringing promise of abundant harvest. 

It is so pleasant to feel that something you 
have said has brought suggestion to any one. I 
speak of this because just now a card has reached 
me from a young woman who has started out as 
a tourist guide in her own native city of Boston, 
and as a commission shopper as well. She has 
been looking for some time for the something 
130 



INSURANCE AND ADVERTISING. 131 

to do for which she is specially well fitted, and 
which she would like. She has not sat with 
folded hands while she has waited, not at all ; 
she has done the work that has come to her to 
do, but in the meantime she has kept a pair ot 
very bright eyes open for the right thing. It 
has come at last, and she has started out to see 
what can be done. I hope she will succeed, 
and indeed I think she will, for such sturdy cour- 
age as she has shown in making her fight with 
circumstance is not easily daunted. Now if any 
of my readers are visiting Boston and want some 
one to show them about, or have friends coming 
here who are strange to the city and want to see 
as much as they can in a short time, it would be 
a very good plan for them to write to Miss Alice 
C. Bradbury, No. 40 Berkeley street, Boston, and 
ask her to meet them at the station on their ar- 
rival,' and attend to them while they are in town. 
It will be both pleasant and profitable for all 
parties. 

The advantage of a tourist guide was made 



132 INSURANCE AND ADVERTISING. 

more than ever apparent to me by an experience 
which I had in a railway train not long since. 
I had taken the cars on the New York and New 
England railroad for my summer home about 
twenty-five miles from the city, and was sharing 
the seat with a very bright, pretty girl, who, I 
soon found from her conversation with another 
young lady in the seat back of her, had been 
" doing " Boston. She was very much mixed up 
about places and buildings, the only point that 
she seemed to have distinctly in mind being the 
Art Museum. Now Copley Square in which 
the Museum is situated, has about it, as all Bos- 
tonians know, some very important buildings. 
Here is beautiful Trinity Church with La Farge's 
wonderful interior characters ; here is the new 
Public Library, rapidly approaching completion ; 
here is the new church building of the Old South 
Society and the new building of the Old Second 
Church of Boston, and here is the famous 
Chauncy Hall School from which have graduated 
so many of Boston's notable men. Why, the lit- 



INSURANCE AND ADVERTISING. 133 

tie triangle that everybody will call a square, is 
full of interest to the stranger. I heard these 
young girls wondering about it all, and quite 
forgetting that they were strangers, I began tel- 
ling them just what they wanted to know. How 
glad they were to know all this and how sorry 
that they had missed the knowledge when they 
were on the spot. Of course they knew all 
about Dr. Phillips Brooks, and they were so 
disappointed when they knew that they had 
passed by his church, which they might have 
gone into had they known. The Public Library 
they had noticed, and the Technology buildings 
and the Natural History rooms, but did not know 
what they were. They had had friends from 
Chauncy Hall and knew all about it, and to 
think they had been so near it, and did not real- 
ize its nearness. I found in talking with them 
that they really had seen nothing of the city that 
they should have seen ; they had been to Nan- 
tasket beach, and had ridden aimlessly about 
in horse-cars, hoping to stumble upon something. 



134 INSURANCE AND ADVERTISING. 

But they had not been to the beautiful parks, the 
open-air gymnasium, the old Paul Revere house, 
the North Church where the lantern hung, nor 
any of the real places of interest. Now, if they 
had only had some one to show them about they 
would have seen all these things, and more too, 
and would have carried away a very good knowl- 
edge of what Boston held of interest. 

Just here I would like to say that I wish I 
could reply personally to all the letters I receive 
from girls and women, detailing their experi- 
ences. It is impossible to do this, however, and 
I take this opportunity of saying how much in 
sympathy I am with all the work of endeavor, 
how glad I am for every success. I wish I could 
plan ways for all who ask, but that is quite im- 
possible. I can only give the suggestion and 
the advice ; the carrying out must be done by 
yourselves. I give in my papers, as far as pos- 
sible, the ways to do, but of course any one at- 
tempting the work may find it necessary to modify 
or adapt these ways to meet individual cases. 



INSURANCE AND ADVERTISING. 135 

You must use judgment and thought, and per- 
haps you may have to experiment a little, but 
earnest purpose and courage always win. It may 
need a little patience ; things don't come the first 
minute ; if you can only remember that you are 
to persist. I have known people who have 
given up just on the eve of success. They have 
been almost at the point of attainment when 
patience and courage have failed them, and they 
have let go their hold, and lost what they might 
have kept. This in answer to the many letters 
and appeals which I have received. 

I cannot tell you very much about it, but I 
know that some women are making a success in 
the insurance business. I know one woman in 
Boston who has all she can do. She is making 
a good income, and has been so successful that 
she has been given the agency of several of the 
leading companies of London. She has an office 
in one of the largest business buildings in the 
city, and it is a busy place. The detail of work 
I cannot tell you about, but I know this one 



136 INSURANCE AND ADVERTISING. 

woman says that it is a good and remunerative 
business for her sex, and she wonders that more 
of them do not take it up. I don't know whether 
there is another woman insurance agent in the 
country, but I know this one, and know that she 
is an enthusiast in her business. I would like 
to give you her name, but she is very sensitive 
about being talked of, and I promised her that I 
would only give the fact of her success, if she 
would allow it, as I wanted it to use as a sugges- 
tion for some of the girls who might like to try 
the experiment for themselves. Many women 
are employed in the agencies as clerks, but I 
don't believe there are many who have attempted 
to establish themselves as agents. 

Another business which women are entering 
is that of advertising agents, and in this they 
have succeeded admirably. The late Mrs. 
Susan C. Vogl was for many years the adver- 
tising agent for the Woman's Journal, and she 
brought the paper into prosperity by her able 
endeavors. She made herself friends by her 



INSURANCE AND ADVERTISING. 137 

genial cordiality. She was true and honest, 
and her every statement could be relied upon. 
Men used to say sometimes that they would 
give Mrs. Vogl advertisements when they would 
not give them to any one else. It was Mrs. 
Vogl's sunniness that won every time, and her 
genuine good-will to everybody. There are one 
or two advertising firms in Boston composed of 
women, and they do a very good business. They 
have a large number of patrons, and they con- 
trol several newspapers, They evidently are 
making money, for everything about them bears 
the stamp of prosperity. 

I know of only one woman who has undertaken 
railroad advertising, and she has done so well that 
her story is worth telling. She controls the ad- 
vertising along the entire line of the New York 
and New England railroad, and no one can ad- 
vertise without making the terms through her. 
When the Chicago fire occurred, she was a happy 
young wife, with a lovely little baby, living in the 
midst of luxury, for she was the petted daughter 



138 INSURANCE AND ADVERTISING. 

of rich parents, and the cherished wife of a still 
more wealthy man. This young couple had every- 
thing before them to make life bright and pleas- 
ant. Riches, social position, youth, a lovely home, 
a dear little girl — it seemed as though nothing 
was wanting. But the fire came, and swept away 
everything ; the home, the property, all, and left 
them with little beside themselves, and their 
youth, their baby and their willing hands. If that 
had been the end ! But the husband and father 
fell ill from exposure at the time of the fire, and 
died leaving the young wite and baby to face the 
world alone. They had something left, but not 
enough to live as the wite would like, and there 
would be the child to educate. So she came 
East and went to work. She had friends in 
plenty, and there were those who were ready to 
give her a home, and render it unnecessary tc 
labor. But she was an independent body, and 
she proposed to work out her own destiny. She 
tried one or two things, going a step in advance 
every change that she made, until finally this 



INSURANCE AND ADVERTISING. 139 

opportunity came to her. It was a large under- 
taking, but it found a woman ready to meet it, 
and not only ready but entirely able. She under- 
took the work, and is making a great success of 
it. She has an office in Boston where she makes 
her contracts, attending personally to them, for 
she has found that her own judgment is better 
than any one's whom she can obtain, and the 
terms are sure to be more satisfactory if she 
makes them herself. She is a capital business 
woman, and no man ever attempts taking unfair 
advantage because she is a woman. Through- 
out all she has remained the same refined, charm- 
ing woman that she was when she was a purely 
society woman ; and she is so evidently the gen- 
tlewoman that men become more gracious when 
in her presence, recognizing the womanly ele- 
ment even when in the most intricate of busi- 
ness problems. Her little daughter has grown 
to gracious sweet womanhood, under a careful 
mother's eye, and is the housekeeper and home 
companion in a dear little cosey home in a fash- 



140 INSURANCE AND ADVERTISING. 

ionable quarter of Boston, where she is sur- 
rounded by the friends who have stood by her 
all through her career. 

It is the presence of women of this kind in the 
business world that makes it a desirable place 
for other women. It is the influence of women 
like this that makes it easier for other women 
when they are in the world, and it is an exam- 
ple like hers that should be regarded by the 
women who are to become business women. 

There is one thing that this woman does not 
do that I would like to emphasize. She does not 
consider it necessary, because she has her way 
to make in the world, and because she does it in 
the business world, to copy the dress and man- 
ners of the men whom she meets. She is essen- 
tially womanly in dress and manner. She does 
not wear Henley shirts nor four-in-hand neckties. 
She is content to be a woman, and to keep her 
womanly ways. She wears, as she should, simple 
tailor-made dresses at her office, but there is no 
suggestion of mannishness about them. Herbon- 



INSURANCE AND ADVERTISING. 141 

nets are becoming, and her hair prettily arranged. 
All the trifling accessories of the toilette are at- 
tended to, and she is as fresh and dainty in her 
office gown as she is in her pretty dresses at 
home. 

I wish I could imbue every girl who is setting 
out to make her own way with the idea that she 
will get on better, and win more genuine respect 
from those she comes in contact with, if she keeps 
her refined femininity, than she will by aping 
the men in dress or manner. Boldness is not 
independence, self-assertion is not success. Be 
what you are, and assume nothing else. Gain 
respect for your sex, by the respect that you win 
for yourself, by your honest, fearless, but sweet 
true womanliness. 



CHAPTER XII. 

PIANO AND ORGAN TUNING. 

1" DON'T know how many of the girls who are 
searching through these papers in the hope 
of finding the suggestion that shall open the way 
for their own advancement, know what success- 
ful piano and organ tuners girls make, nor how 
many there are employed in this business. Has 
it always seemed to you a man's business ? 
Well, why should it be ? It is pleasant, not diffi- 
cult, and more sheltered than many other em- 
ployments which take women out of their homes. 
The first time that I ever saw them at' such 
work, or even knew that they had attempted it, 
was when I visited the Estey Organ Factory in 
Brattleboro, Vt., a few years ago. This pretty 
town in the Connecticut valley was my girlhood's 
142 



PIANO AND ORGAN TUNING. 143 

home, and on a return visit, I went through 
the enlarged organ manufactory, in company 
with my friend, Mrs. Fuller, whose father, Deacon 
Jacob Estey, was the founder of the business, 
and whose husband was a partner in the house. 
As we came out into the hall that led into the 
tuning department, Mrs. Fuller said to me : 

" You will find somebody in here whom you 
know," at the same time opening a door. 

As I entered a young woman looked up from 
the organ she was tuning, with an exclamation 
of surprise which I echoed. It was a former 
schoolmate, whom I had not seen since we were 
in school together. I was surprised to find her 
there, and from her I learned that she was by 
no means the only woman employed there in the 
same capacity — that of tuner. 

" Deacon Estey," as every one called him, was 
a very progressive man, and his daughter stood 
in as high regard as his son in the family. He 
believed in woman's capacity and ability to do 
the finer parts of mechanical work, and when 



144 PIANO AND ORGAN TUNING. 

the opportunity came he put his theory to a 
practical test. When a woman was introduced 
into the factory, the men tuners were very indig- 
nant, and after holding a meeting at which they 
expressed themselves very freely, and worked 
themselves into a very wrathy frame of mind, 
they waited upon their employer and demanded 
that the offending woman be sent away. The 
alternative was given him of discharging her or 
losing them. He listened to them very patiently, 
and when they were through, he answered them 
with as much determination as they had shown, 
but with no anger. The woman was there, she 
did her work satisfactorily, she was to stay. Of 
course they could do as they chose about re- 
maining ; every man had a right to do what 
seemed best for himself; but he should never be 
guilty of an injustice to please any one. The 
men listened, withdrew — and stayed. As the 
work increased and the business was enlarged, 
other women were taken in. 

It is a pleasure to be able to record that this 



PIANO AND ORGAN TUNING. 1 45 

introduction of women was not made in the in- 
terests of " economy " ; they received the same 
wages as the men who did the same kind of 
work, and had every advantage that was given 
their fellow workers. Good Deacon Estey has 
gone on, out of this world, but women should 
always have a kindly thought for him, and hold 
him in grateful remembrance. 

A few years since, not more than ten, in re- 
sponse to the rapidly increasing demand for 
practical instruction in tuning pianos, there was 
introduced into the New England Conservatory 
a department which should afford special facili- 
ties for the development of this important art. 
Among those who applied for admission were a 
number of young women ; they were cordially 
welcomed, for Dr. Tourjee is another man who 
believes in the capacity of women to excel in 
various directions. Their progress was noted 
with special interest, for these were the first, so 
far as can be learned, who had undertaken, in 
Boston, at least, a systematic study of the theory 



146 PIANO AND ORGAN TUNING. 

and practice of tuning. To the great satisfac- 
tion of the management, their advancement was 
from the start both rapid and thorough, and 
before the first term was ended, it became evi- 
dent that a new field of endeavor had been 
found for girls. As time passed, the highest 
expectations were abundantly realized ; the 
young women easily kept pace with the young 
men who were pursuing the same course, and 
amply proved their entire ability to excel in this 
new line of work. From that time the propor- 
tion of women to men students has constantly 
increased, until now they bid fair to be in the 
majority ; and years of active effort by the 
women who have received an education in this 
department have proved beyond a question their 
special adaptation to the work. 

In introducing this new profession for women 
it was fully expected that the same prejudice 
and opposition would be encountered which 
have always greeted any innovation, and those 
who were instrumental in bringing the move- 



PIANO AND ORGAN TUNING, 1 47 

ment forward, prepared themselves carefully to 
defend it. They knew that the objections would 
be just what they turned out to be. The first 
one was that young women would lack the nec- 
essary physical strength. To this they had the 
ready reply that the demands made upon the 
strength were not so great as were those made 
in factories, mills, sewing rooms, or even 
kitchens ; in fact, that the tuner's work was not 
so fatiguing as were many of the employments 
in which women were constantly engaged, and 
which came under the head of "women's work." 
The second objection made was that women as 
a rule lacked mechanical ingenuity. The only 
answer needed to this objection was to point to 
the many manufactories where the nicest me- 
chanical skill is necessary, and which are 
crowded by women operatives. The third ob- 
jection was that women lacked the power of 
application necessary to the acquirement of a 
difficult mechanical art. Time has answered 
that argument, as it alone could, and the expe* 



I48 PIANO AND ORGAN TUNING. 

rience of the years since the department was 
first instituted has proven that young women, 
with the naturally delicate ear and touch, possess 
peculiar qualifications for this work, and that 
the fine discrimination necessary to the tuning 
of an instrument is characteristic of them. 

The attractions which the profession of tun- 
ing presents are many. The work itself is well 
classed among the arts, being the correct adjust- 
ment of a musical instrument to the purposes 
of artistic expression. But I said in the begin- 
ning that the occupations to be considered would 
not lie in the provinces of the arts or professions, 
so, to be quite consistent, I shall speak of this 
new work as an employment or a business. 

The manual labor necessary to the accom- 
plishment of this branch of work is calculated 
to make it healthful and strengthening, and the 
mental application is sufficient to impart zest 
and interest to it, while it is attended also with 
the satisfaction of immediate results. Aside 
from the limited amount of tuning done during 



PIANO AND ORGAN TUNING. 



149 



the construction of the instrument, the sphere 
of the tuner in the homes of the people, or in 
the warerooms of music dealers, lies in sharp 
contrast to the life in shops and mills. The 
profession is conspicuously one in which there 
is, and is to be, plenty of room. A glance at 
the actual condition of the country, as concerns 
the tuning of pianos, and the numbers of in- 
struments demanding constant attention, proves 
this. In the cities, naturally enough, the pro- 
fession is fairly represented, although there the 
number of thoroughly educated tuners is lim- 
ited, while, as I dare say many of you realize, 
in almost any part of the United States there 
are whole counties, containing hundreds of 
pianos, with new ones being constantly added, 
where only an occasional traveling tuner can be 
found to hurriedly attend to them all. With the 
vast number of old pianos, which each year de- 
mand more care as they show additional signs 
of wear, and the thousands of new ones, which 
scores of manufactories are producing yearly, 



150 PIANO AND ORGAN TUNING. 

to say nothing of many times the number of 
organs, there is surely no occupation which 
promises a more abundant and ever-increasing 
business than this of tuning. Every piano made 
requires care, whether it is used much or little. 
And as the country increases in wealth and the 
art of music becomes more universal, especially 
as pianos become lower in price and are in even 
greater demand than now, the question very 
naturally arises, who shall keep these countless 
numbers in condition to be used? This then 
is a new field of labor opening to women, 
another avenue in which our girls may seek 
employment. 

Not every girl would succeed ; not every girl 
will be attracted to the new field ; but there is 
work and remuneration for those who are. In 
regard to the qualifications necessary to a per- 
fect acquirement of this business, it may be said 
that a correct musical ear, a fair amount of 
musical intelligence, and a desire to excel, are 
the requisites. 



PIANO AND ORGAN TUNING. 151 

It has been impossible in these chapters to 
do more than indicate certain ways, out of many 
others, by which girls may obtain a livelihood, 
and make an assured future for themselves. If 
the hints that have been given shall be found 
to contain anything of value to the readers, if 
any have been helped out of dark places, and 
set on the way with faces toward the light, I 
shall feel that the work has not been in vain. 



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D. LOTHROP COMPANY'S 



YONGE (Charlotte M.). 

LANCES OF LYNWOOD. ismo, illustrated, i.co. (4) 
Recommended by the State Boards of several States for their public school libraries. 

" ' The Lances of Lynwood ' is con- " It is full of the ring and romance or 

structed of fourteenth-century materials the feudal ages, describing the brighc 

gathered from historical and legendary side and ennobling influences of chiv 

granaries. It is one of the best books airy." — Living Churc h, Chicago, 

for our boys and girls. It opens up his- "There is a true adherence to natur;. 

tory, quickens the imagination and fixes and great dramatic skill displayed in the 

the love of reading." — Syracuse Stan- exhibition of character" — North Brit- 

dard. ish Review. 

GOLDEN DEEDS. i2mo, illustrated, cloth, i.oo; gilt top. 
1.25. (4) 

Heroic and noble actions mostly culled out of history, making fifty different tales or. 
lofty duty, for young and old. 

THE PRINCE AND THE PAGE. i2mo, illustrated, 1.0c 
(4) 

A story of the Last Crusade. 

THE LITTLE DUKE : Richard the Fearless. i2mo, illu3 
trated, 1.00. (4) 

LITTLE LUCY'S WONDERFUL GLOBE. 23 f ull-pag* 
illustrations, i2mo, cloth, .75. 

HISTORICAL SERIES. 

Recommended by the State Boards of several States for their public school libraries 
Miss Yonge, while always boldly and continuously outlining the course of historic^ 
events, has the knack of seizing upon incidents which reveal the true character of his- 
torical personages, so that these volumes are eminently calculated to teach as well as 
to interest. The language is simple yet expressive, the freedom of treatment bold yet 
accurate. The characters appear and disappear with all the serious brevity of moving 
time, and seem to speak for themselves. 

YOUNG FOLKS' BIBLE HISTORY. i2mo, illustrated 

1.50. 

" The author presents in her dramatic " One of the best books for its purpose 

style many of the striking incidents and which we have found." — Christian. 

stories of the sacred book. It is not only Register. 

entertaining, but as fascinating as any " We shall be much mistaken if this 

romance, yet nothing of the spirit of the book does not prove to be useful in many 

Bible is disturbed, and the lesson is only homes, in fixing the facts of Scripture 

more vividly brought out by the genius history in the young minds and in giving 

of the artist." — IVestern Educational them a good persDective of that history 

Joziriuxl, Chicago. as a whole." — Independent, New York. 

YOUNG FOLKS' HISTORY OF ENGLAND. i 2 mo, 

illustrated, 1.50. 

Beginning with a period prior to the Christian era, it outlines English history 
through the vicissitudes of the Roman, Danish and Norman invasions, through ihe 
subsequent civil strifes, and a large portion of the peaceful reign of the good Victoria 
Only those facts are presented which are at once most picturesque, most interesting 
and most easily comprehended. In the hands of the young it is an irresistible tempt* 
tion to history. 

YOUNG FOLKS' HISTORY OF FRANCE. i2mo, illus 
trated, 1.50. 

To arrange the confused facts of French history in such an order as to make thenr 
comprehensible to children is a difficult task. Miss Yonge has undertaken to do this 
and has succeeded admirably. She has done more than tell an interesting story, for 
she has attached some real characteristic to each reign, and has translated the leading 
political motives into something that can enter an intellect of seven or eight years old 



SELKCT LIST OF BOOKS. 



EASTMAN (Julia A.). 

Miss Eastman has a large circle of young admirers. She carries off the palm as a 
writer of school-life stories, and teachers are always glad to find their scholars reading 
Miss Eastman's books. Her style is characterized by quick movements, sparkling 
expression and incisive knowledge of human nature. 

KITTY KENT'S TROUBLES. i2mo, illustrated, 1.25. (5 ) 

"Miss Eastman, it will be remembered, tive of her trials and experiences is in 

took the prize of one thousand dollars tended as a guide and help to other girls 

offered several years ago by this house. who have those of the same kind to con 

The heroine of the present book is the tend with, and to impress upon them the 

daughter of a clergyman, 'a girl who was lesson that 'the only road to happiness 

neither all good nor all bad, but partly the lies through the land of goodness. ,y, — N 

one and partly the other ' ; and the narra- E . Journal of Education. 

STRIKING FOR THE RIGHT. i2mo, illustrated, 1.25. (3; 

A story illustrating the necessity of kindness to animals. The pupils of the Eastford 
High School form a humane society which does a noble work. 

A Premium of $1000 was awarded the author for this MS. by the examining committee. 

SHORT COMINGS AND LONG GOINGS. i2mo, ilius> 
trated, 1.25. 
The ups and downs of wide-awake boy and girl life in a country home. 

SCHOOLDAYS OF BEULAH ROMNEY. i2mo, fflus 

trated, 1.25. (5) 

An aged Christian woman befriends a dozen careless schoolgirls and helps them ouu 
of the mauy troubles that invade their lives. 

YOUNG RICK. i2mo, 12 full-page illustrations by SoL 

Eytinge, Jr., 1.25 (5) 

Young Rick was a genuine boy, mischievous and motherless. Aunt Lesbia, witn 
whom he lived, was not used to children and found it no easy task to look after him. 
In the end, however, her kindness and good sense made a man of him. 

THE ROMNEYS OF RIDGEMONT. 121110, illustrated, 
1.25. (5) 

A story of the New England hills ; of sugaring and haymow conferences and old- 
fashioned picnics. 



EASY READING. 

Chromoon side. Numerous illustrations, 6 vols., iSmo, 1.50. 
Easy Reading. Natural History. 

Birds and Fishes. Illustrated Primer. 

Book of Animals, Book of Birds. 



D. LOTHROP COMPANY'S 



BAILY (Rev. Thomas L.). 

POSSIBILITIES. i2mo, 1.25. 

The author gives at the opening the picture of a country village school which, 
through lack of tact and knowledge or. the part of teachers and of interest on the 
part of parents, had become almost worthless. A new teacher, with a mind and 
method of her own, is engaged for a term, and she sets at work with a determination 
to revolutionize the existing condition of things. It requires a good deal of tact and 
management toenust parents and pupils in her plans, but she does it by quiet persist- 
ence, and the end of the term sees not only a remarkable change in the school, but in 
the village itself. 

"Asa general rule novels with a pur- exceptions, however, and one of these is 
pose are dry reading. There aie brilliant ' Possibilities.' " — Alba?iy A rgus. 

ONLY ME. i2mo, 1.25. 

" We are taken back to the days when The boy is taken home by the watchman, 

the watchman n ade his nightly rounds and the story follows him through early 

to call the hour and the state of the yearsand through his experience as bound 

weather. On his return from one of boy on a farm, and his subsequent start- 

these rounds on a snowy night, a good- ing in life in a store in the city wheie he 

hearted watchman finds a little fellow rises to be confidential clerk and at last 

half starved and half frozen, crouched pattner in the firm." — Natiotial Bap- 

against the little sentiy-box in which he tist, Phila. 
m'mself found shelter between his rounds. 

BAKER (Ella M.). 

CLOVER LEAVES : A collection of Poems. Compiled and 
arranged by K. G. B. i2mo, cloth, 1,00; gilt edges, 1.25. 

A brief memoir tells the story of the short hfe of tne young poet. 

"The author of these poems was which it appeals. " — Springfield Repub- 
rx)ssessed of the rarest loveliness of per- lican. 

son and character, and she has left behind "One rises from the perusal of these 

ner a memory fragrant with blessing. poems with the feeling of having been 
Her verse was the natural outcome of brought very near to a Christian woman's 
jier beautiful soul ; its exceeding delicacy heart, and of having caught the utter- 
and sweetness are sufficient to charm all ances of a truly devout spirit." — Mom- 
who have the answering sentiment to ing Star. 

SOLDIER AND SERVANT. i2mo, 1.25. 

" A pretty and helpful story of girl Their several successes and failures are 

.lfe. Six or seven girls band themselves told, and many lessons are drawn from 

together to cultivate their talents in the their work."— Golden Rule, Boston. 

best possible manner, and to let their ^ " The book is remarkably entertain- 

jght shine whenever and wherever they ing, sensible and spiritually stimulating, 

can. The girls vary greatly, but each It is the best book of the kind that we 

one is determined to do her best with the have seen in many months." — Congre- 

material that the Lord has given her. gationalist. 

SEVEN EASTER LILIES. i2mo, 1.25. 

A story for girls, pure, sweet, and full of encouragement, and calculated to exert a 
strong influence for good. The author feels that there is something peculiarly 
sacred and tender about Easter lilies, partly, perhaps, from their association with the 
day and season whose name they bear. The story tells what became of seven lilies 
which were tended by as many different hands in different homes, and how they 
affected those homes by the silent lessons they taught. 

CHRISTMAS PIE STORIES. i2mo, illustrated, 1.25. 

Never was such a Christmas pie before, nor such plums! Not one, but seven Jack 
Horner pulled out of that pie, and every plum was a Christmas story told by each 
member of the family from grandma down. The wonderful pie lost nothing in beinr 
warmed over for Aunt Moneywort who was too ill to be at the feast. 



SELECT LIST OF BOOKS. 



BATES (Clara Doty). 

^SOP'S FABLES (Versified). With 72 full-page illustrations 
by Garrett, Lungren, Sweeney, Barnes and Hassam. Quarto, 
cloth, 1.50. (4) 

"Mrs. Bates has turned the wit and awake young people." — Boston Journal. 

wisdom in a dozen ot ^Esop's Fables " The illustrations introduce all classes 

into jolly rhythmical narratives, whose of subjects, and are original and superior 

good humor will be appreciated by wide- work." — Boston Globe. 

BLIND JAKEY. Illustrated, i6mo, .50. (5) 

HEART'S CONTENT. i2mo, 1.25. 

See Child Lore (Clara Doty Bates, editor). 



BATES (Katherine Lee). 

SUNSHINE. Oblong 32mo, illustrated by W. L. Taylor, .'50. 

A little poem, in which the wild flowers and sunshine play their part in driving 

away the bad temper of a little lass who had hidden away in the grass in a fit of sulks. 

SANTA CLAUS RIDDLE. A Poem. Square i2mo, illus- 
trated in colors, paper, .35. 

See Wedding- Day Book (Katherine Lee Bates editor). 

BEDSIDE POETRY. 

Edited by Wendell P. Garrison. i6mo, plain cloth, .75; fancy 
cloth, 1. 00. 

This collection is for the home, and for a particular season. " Few fathers and 
mothers." says Mr. Garrison, "appreciate the peculiar value of the bedtime hour for 
confirming filial and parental affection, and for conveying reproof to ears never so 
attentive or resistlesss. Words said then sink deep, and the reading of poetry of a 
high moral tone and, at the same time, of an attractive character, is apt to plant seed 
which will bear good fruit in the future." 

"There is seldom a compilation of Emerson and Cowper, Wordsworth, 
verse at once so wisely limited and so Leigh Hunt, Shelley, Southey, Coler- 
well extended, so choice in character and idge, William Blake, Burns, Thackeray, 
so fine in quality as Bedside Poetry, edi- Lowell, Tennyson, Shakespeare, Mrs. 
ted by Wendell P. Garrison. He has Hemans, Mrs. Kemble, Holmes, Whit- 
chosen four-score pieces ' of a rather high tier and Arthur Hugh Clough. We find 
order, the remembrance of which will be cheer and courage, truth and fortitude, 
a joy forever and a potent factor in the purity and humor, and all the great posi- 
formation not merely of character but of tive virtues, put convincingly in these 
literary taste.' Therefore he has given selections." — Springfield Republican. 



BELL (Mrs. Lucia Chase). 

TRUE BLUE. i2mo, 10 illustrations by Merrill, 1.25. (5; 

The scene is laid in the far West, and the incidents are such as could only occur in 
a newly developed country, where even children are taught to depend upon themselves. 

" Doe, the warm-hearted, irrpulsive copying by those who lead her adven- 
heroine of the story, is an original char- tures and experiences." — Detroit Post- 
acter, and one whose ways are well worth 



